China c.bank says to promote healthy development of property market
China's central bank has vowed to
promote healthy development of the country's real estate market, saying it will
safeguard the legal rights of home buyers and better satisfy their reasonable
living needs.
The statement from the People's Bank
of China (PBOC), made following its fourth-quarter monetary policy committee
meeting on Saturday, is the latest sign that Chinese regulators are marginally
easing curbs on the property sector to prevent a hard-landing.
Echoing China's annual Central
Economic Work Conference held in early December, the PBOC said it will
prioritise economic stability, amid an increasingly severe external environment
and the unrelenting global pandemic.
"The PBOC turned more cautious
on its growth outlook, indicated an intention to use broad and targeted policy
tools to support the real economy in a more pro-active manner, and on the
margin eased its tone on the property sector," said analysts at Goldman
Sachs in a note on Sunday.
"We expect the central bank to
inject more long-term liquidity via RRR cuts and various lending facilities,
on-budget fiscal expenditures to be more supportive to growth compared with
2021, and local governments to ease property policies at local levels."
The PBOC said it will keep its
monetary policy flexible and appropriate, and liquidity reasonably ample. It
will strengthen support to the real economy, with a bias toward small
companies.
The central bank reiterated that it
will deepen reforms of the forex market and increase the flexibility of the
yuan's exchange rate while guiding companies and financial institutions to be
"risk neutral".