China's central bank on Wednesday held a meeting to promote its financial support for affordable housing in a bid to accelerate sales of unsold housing stock, as a property crisis threatens growth in the world's second-largest economy, Reuters reported. The central bank last month set up a 300 billion yuan ($41.4 billion) relending loan facility for affordable housing, and Wednesday's virtual meeting hosted from the city of Jinan in eastern Shandong province is the latest effort to promote the facility among local governments and banks.

The European Union will apply additional duties of up to 38% on imported Chinese electric vehicles from July in a latest effort to protect home-grown manufacturers, Reuters reported. It has also launched several probes into whether Chinese clean tech producers are dumping subsidised goods on EU markets and whether Chinese-owned companies unfairly benefit from subsidies while operating inside the European Union. The European Commission, which is carrying out the investigations, says its aim is to prevent unfair competition and market distortion.

China Evergrande New Energy Vehicle’s shares fell sharply after Chinese authorities ordered the company to repay government subsidies due to its failure to meet contractual obligations, adding to its woes, the Wall Street Journal reported. Shares of the electric-vehicle unit of property developer China Evergrande Group slid 21% to 34 Hong Kong cents (4 U.S. cents) on Wednesday morning, on track for their largest one-day loss in almost a year.

The list of Chinese developers facing court-ordered liquidation in Hong Kong is getting longer, after a builder of homes in an affluent eastern coastal region was ordered to wind up. Dexin China Holdings Co. received the order Tuesday, three months after a petition was filed by China Construction Bank (Asia), and a year and half after it defaulted, Bloomberg News reported. A new restructuring plan was approved last year, though the developer, which builds residential as well as commercial buildings, wasn’t able to keep up with that either.

China Evergrande New Energy Vehicle Group faces the risk of losing assets such as land and equipment, the company said on Tuesday, as local administrative bodies demand repayment of 1.9 billion yuan ($261.91 million) in subsidies by its units, Reuters reported. The local bodies last month sent a letter of demand asking unit Evergrande Automotive Holdings to terminate a series of investment cooperation agreements made between the parties since April 29, 2019.

China's efforts to clear massive inventory by turning unsold homes into affordable housing are unlikely to help cash-strapped developers due to the programme's limited size and potentially low prices, analysts and developers say, Reuters reported. As part of a support package for the crisis-hit property sector, Beijing announced last month a plan for a 300 billion yuan ($41 billion) lending facility, which could result in 500 billion worth of bank financing for local state-owned enterprises (SOEs) to purchase completed and unsold homes.

As China’s property downturn grinds into a fourth year and house prices continue their downward march, an increasing number of mortgages are slipping underwater, placing fresh financial strain on both households and banks, Bloomberg News reported. Now, with income growth slowing and job losses increasing, people are questioning whether it’s worth the struggle to pay a loan on a property that’s in negative equity. The spectre of negative equity is also concerning banks.

China Vanke said that it will pay a dollar bond due Friday, the state-backed property developer’s final offshore debt obligation for the year, seeking to calm liquidity concerns amid China’s continuing property crisis, the Wall Street Journal reported. The Shenzhen-based company said late Wednesday that it deposited $612.6 million into unit Vanke Real Estate’s bank account to pay the principal and interest on a $600 million 4.2% offshore medium-term note. The note, issued in March 2019, is the property developer’s third offshore bond due this year.

A private gauge of China’s services sector signaled the fastest pace of growth in 10 months in May, echoing official data thanks to strong business activity and market demand, the Wall Street Journal reported. The Caixin services purchasing managers index increased to 54.0 in May from 52.5 in April, Caixin Media Co. and S&P Global said Wednesday. The index, which has now stayed in expansion territory for 17 straight months, reached its highest level since July 2023. A reading above 50 suggests expansion, while one below indicates contraction.

A group of creditors of China South City has filed a lawsuit in Hong Kong against the developer's biggest state-owned shareholder to recover $1.4 billion, according to a court filing and a source familiar with the matter, Reuters reported. The lawsuit is the first such case against a Chinese state shareholder of a developer for recovery of payments owed to creditors under the keepwell provision since the property sector tipped into a debt crisis in 2021.