BEIJING--New credit issued by Chinese banks and other financial institutions came in higher than expected in August, offering a continued support to the world's second-largest economy as it recovers from the Covid-19 pandemic.
Chinese banks issued 1.28 trillion yuan ($187.29 billion) worth of new yuan loans in August, slightly higher than market expectations, official data released Friday showed.
Economists polled by The Wall Street Journal expected CNY1.2 trillion of new loans in August. In July, new loans stood at CNY992.7 billion.
Total social financing, a broader measurement of credit in the economy that includes both bank loans and nonbank financing, was CNY3.58 trillion in August, up sharply from CNY1.69 trillion in July. The surge of aggregated credit was boosted by corporate financing via banker's acceptance and bond issuance, as well as bonds issued by local governments, according to data released by the People's Bank of China.
China's broadest measure of money supply, M2, was up 10.4% at the end of August from a year earlier, lower than the 10.7% rise at the end of July. The figure was below the median forecast for a 10.7% increase in the WSJ poll.
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