China

Chains of guarantees, in which companies back loans to other firms, are causing pain for the wider Chinese economy, The Wall Street Journal reported. The central bank cut benchmark lending and deposit rates on Friday to reduce financing costs for companies and help revive growth. Guarantees played a large role in fueling China’s rapid debt expansion over the last six years.

In a related story, China’s central bank said its surprise move to cut interest rates for the first time since 2012 is designed to help small firms and protect depositors instead of all-out monetary easing. How the nation’s lenders respond will determine if it works out that way, Bloomberg News reported. The bulk of bank debt in China is still concentrated on big borrowers, with outstanding credit to small firms less than a third of total loans. The People’s Bank of China’s rate cuts came after months of targeted measures failed to lower financing costs for smaller companies.

South America’s most economically troubled country, facing fears of a debt default amid tumbling oil prices and a cash crunch, has been thrown a lifeline by its largest lender, China, The Wall Street Journal reported. The Asian giant loosened repayment terms on the nearly $50 billion in loans it has granted Venezuela since 2007, according to Venezuela’s Official Gazette. And President Nicolás Maduro said in a speech last week that his finance minister, Rodolfo Marco, would soon travel to China to try to secure new loans. Mr.

China’s central bank is considering changing the way it calculates banks’ loan-to-deposit ratios, a government official briefed on the matter said, signaling efforts to boost credit as the economy falters. Savings that banks hold for non-deposit-taking financial institutions may be classified as deposits, the person said, declining to be identified as he’s not authorized to speak publicly about the matter. Money that banks lent to such institutions would be classified as loans, according to the official. The changes may take effect Jan. 1.

One Hong Kong-based hedge fund has accumulated the prospectuses of no fewer than 250 of the trust companies that sit at the heart of the Chinese shadow banking system. These contain virtually no disclosure except on the value of the real estate that backs loans whether committed or proposed. In some ways, China today resembles Japan in the early to mid-nineties or the US in 2007 to 2008 on the eve of their respective financial crises, both triggered by overvalued property.

China’s bad loans jumped by the most since 2005 in the third quarter, fueling concern that a cooling economy will be further weakened as banks limit lending to avoid credit risks, Bloomberg News reported. Nonperforming loans rose 72.5 billion yuan ($11.8 billion) from the previous quarter to 766.9 billion yuan, the China Banking Regulatory Commission said in a statement on Nov. 15. Soured credit accounted for 1.16 percent of lending, up from 1.08 percent three months earlier.

China’s property market in October has shown some signs of mild improvement, but now may not be the time to heave a sigh of relief, The Wall Street Journal China Real Time blog reported. The year-on-year slide in housing sales moderated in October to 3.1% from the 10.3% recorded in September. Some home buyers apparently returned to property showrooms after Beijing announced a loosening of mortgage rules to support the country’s weakened housing market.

China’s small-loan providers have virtually halved lending as the slowing economy turns both lenders and borrowers more wary of risk, the Financial Times reported. New loans from China’s 8,591 small-loan providers came to just Rmb89bn ($14.5bn) in the first nine months of 2014, virtually half the Rmb161bn level in the same period last year, according to central bank data.

China’s shadow banking sector continued to grow at breakneck speed in 2013 and now ranks as the third largest in the world, a report released by the Financial Stability Board showed on Thursday, the Irish Times reported. The country vaulted ahead in the rankings under a new, more targeted definition of shadow banking adopted by the FSB, a task force set up by G20 economies in the wake of the 2008/09 global financial crisis to improve financial regulations.

Chaori Solar’s default on its Rmb1.09 billion ($195 million) bond may not lead to an acceptable template for resolving similar issues, Finance Asia reported. The Shenzhen-listed solar company, which in March became the first Chinese company to default on its onshore corporate bonds, is likely to see the bond bailed out by state-owned enterprises.