介绍:
China's April retail sales up 11.9 pct
On the Macro-economics front,
China has released a series of slower-than-expected figures for the past few months.
The National Bureau of Statistics says the country's industrial added value expanded 8.7 percent year on year in the first four months. Previous forecast was 8.9 percent.
China uses industrial added value to measure the business operations of designated large enterprises, whose annual main business activity turnover surpasses 20 million yuan, or some 3 million US dollars.
The value-added output of state-owned enterprises rose 4.8 percent in the period, while joint stock companies grew by 10 percent.
Meanwhile, Retail sales and fixed-asset investment spending also came in below forecasts.
Retail sales increased by just under 12% in April, and fixed-asset investments rose some 17% in the four months period.
China's 'shadow banking' sector valued at $5.4 trillion
And speaking of shadow banking,
A new report shows that China's "shadow banking" sector is now valued at 4.4 trillion US dollars.
The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences report also warns of potential risks to the financial system.
According to the report, the shadow banking network is equivalent to nearly one fifth of the domestic banking sector's total assets.
But the figure is lower than an earlier estimate by ratings agency Moody's, which put shadow banking activities at 4.8 trillion US dollars in 2012, more than half of the country's GDP.
Central bank tells banks to quicken mortgage lending
China's central bank has reportedly asked commercial banks to speed up the granting of home loans and to set mortgage rates at reasonable levels.
Media reports say the People's Bank of China made the request at a meeting with commercial banks on Monday.
Home mortgage interest rates reached 6.7 percent in the first quarter, up 17 basis points from the fourth quarter of last year.
China's home prices rose at double-digit rates in most cities last year, but the market has shown signs of cooling since late 2013.
Tight mortgages are considered one of the reasons for the cooling of the property market this year.
Data released today shows that property investment slowed in April, while home sales fell on a year-on-year basis.
Q&A on China's new bank lending
Anchor:
Meanwhile, Bank lending here in China has weakened in April.
New data shows Chinese banks loaned 775-billion yuan last month, down from the 1 trillion loaned the previous month.
Meanwhile, the value of the Renminbi has dipped to its lowest level in some 8 months.
The central bank set its daily parity rate at 6.1636 on Tuesday.
The yuan has fallen about 3% since the start of this year.
For more on this, CRI's Paul James spoke earlier with Gao Shang, an analyst with GuanTong Futures.
…
Back Anchor:
Gao Shang, Analyst with GuanTong Futures.
China Mobile to Launch New 4G Tariff Polices to Attract Users
On the corporate front,
China Mobile is revising its 4G tariff policies to attract more users.
The leading telecom operator has suggested on its official Weibo account that, beginning Wednesday, the remaining data of its 4G users at the end of the month will not be zeroed out.
Leftover data from the current month will automatically be added to the amount of data provided to the user the following month.
It has been around six months since China Mobile launched its 4G service.
But by April this year it only had four million users, far below its target of 30 million by the end of the year.
More details on the policy will be released today.
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