China’s “Covid-zero” policy has limited impact on the economy because measures are highly localized and targeted, according to Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Ltd, Bloomberg News reported. Only around 2.6% of China’s economy in terms of gross domestic product is subject to so-called “dynamic clearing” policy measures currently, economists led by Raymond Yeung wrote in a report Tuesday. Assuming the impact lasts for a quarter, that effect is 0.6% of annual GDP, they estimate.

China’s property developers started 2022 with weak sales, as many real-estate companies struggled to rekindle interest from home buyers despite Beijing’s recent attempts to ease some restrictions on the troubled sector, the Wall Street Journal reported. January contracted sales reports released in recent days by more than a dozen Chinese developers showed year-over-year declines ranging from about 10% to more than 80% for some companies. They also reflected price reductions by industry heavyweights such as Country Garden Holdings Co. Ltd. and Sunac China Holdings Ltd.

China arrested a former senior official at the nation’s banking regulator over alleged bribery, adding to a long list of executives and policy makers caught up in the nation’s latest anti-graft crackdown, Bloomberg News reported. Cai Esheng, the former vice chairman at the banking watchdog who retired in 2013, also faces charges over the abuse of power, The Supreme People’s Procuratorate of the People’s Republic of China said on Thursday.

China Evergrande Group’s EGRNF 9.52% chief executive sold his holdings of company dollar bonds with a face value of $128 million last summer, stock exchange-filings showed, with the sales coming a few weeks before the property developer issued a profit warning, the Wall Street Journal reported. Evergrande CEO Xia Haijun, and Hui Ka Yan, the group’s founder and chairman, have in recent years bought sizable quantities of new bonds from the company, according to company statements and to earlier filings disclosing changes to their holdings.

Some data-driven Chinese hedge funds have stumbled, after several years of eye-catching returns and surging inflows from investors, the Wall Street Journal reported. These quantitative fund managers use statistical models to select stocks and time trades, relying on machine-developed trading algorithms to filter out human weaknesses and find patterns in the market. The rise of Chinese quant investing mirrors earlier growth on Wall Street, with stock markets in both countries being large and liquid.

China eased a year-long cap on loans for the real estate sector to fund public rental housing, the latest bid by authorities to tackle a slumping property market, Bloomberg News reported. Bank loans to fund low-cost rental projects will no longer be subject to regulatory curbs, the People’s Bank of China said in a statement on Tuesday. The rules required banks to trim their loan exposure to the property sector to a certain level.

The Chinese government could take further measures if needed to keep the yuan stable, potentially putting downward pressure on the currency, a former foreign exchange regulator said, Reuters reported. Policymakers could increase yuan's flexibility, expand capital outflows, or control capital inflows to rein in the yuan, which could deviate from economic fundamentals in the short term, wrote Guan Tao, global chief economist at BOC International and a former official at the State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE).

Ecuador expects to pull together a trade deal with China at the end of this year and will begin formal debt re-negotiations with the Asian country, Ecuadorean President Guillermo Lasso said on Saturday, after a Beijing visit with his counterpart Xi Jinping, Reuters reported. China became Ecuador's top lender over the last decade, with millions of dollars in long-term credit tied to the handover of crude oil, large investments in hydro-electric and mining projects and other loans. "In China we had a productive meeting with the President Xi Jinping," Lasso posted on Twitter.

Receivers have been appointed over land in Hong Kong that China Evergrande Group used as collateral for a $520 million loan, but the sale of the plot won’t affect the company’s broader restructuring, the troubled developer said, the Wall Street Journal reported. Evergrande was notified Wednesday about the move, which relates to a plot of undeveloped residential land located in Yuen Long, the property company said in a filing late Sunday in Hong Kong. It didn’t name the lender.

Imbalances in the Chinese economy have worsened and delayed China’s transition to consumption-led growth, the International Monetary Fund said in an annual review on Friday, slashing its outlook for the country this year, the Wall Street Journal reported. The IMF assessment, in its Article IV review, reflects growing concern among some economists and officials that greater state intervention in the economy could be hindering China’s long-held goal of “high-quality” growth—one driven by consumption rather than investment.