China Cuts Interest Rates to Boost Flagging Economy
China’s central bank has cut interest rates, the first time in over two years. The People’s Bank of China announced on its website it will cut the one-year deposit rate by 0.25 percentage points to 2.75 percent and one-year benchmark lending rate by 0.4 percentage points to 5.6 percent, starting tomorrow.
The surprise move is clearly aimed at boosting China’s flagging economy, set to grow at its slowest annual pace since 1990. In recent days investment, industrial production, and retail sales have all disappointed. China’s real estate market has continued to underperform, even as Beijing has loosened mortgage and down payment requirements.
“It’s absolutely the right thing to do,” Wang Tao, chief China economist at UBS in Hong Kong, told Bloomberg News. “Real interest rates have moved up significantly with slowing growth and inflation, which hurts corporate cash flow and balance sheet and threatens to increase non-performing loans.”