Credit demand weakened in late February, and the growth rate of social finance fell back to the level before the reduction of reserve requirements and interest rates. Affected by the Spring Festival effect and the weakening of credit demand, RMB loans increased by only 1.23 trillion yuan in February 2022, and the good growth momentum in January has not been continued. The growth rate of medium and long-term loans to enterprises fell again, second only to the growth rate of medium and long-term loans in March of 2020, which was far lower than that of short-term loans in the same period of this year. The central bank released financial data on Friday later than the same period in previous years, or it hopes to avoid too much interference to the market. We believe that the tightening of monetary policy of overseas central banks and the intensification of geopolitical risks may be the main factors affecting the turning of credit demand in February, diluting the previous easing effect. In order to achieve the goal of "expanding the scale of new credit", in addition to increasing the easing of monetary policy, it is worth looking forward to the further deregulation of real estate policy.
The market interest rate reveals the demand for credit, which is difficult to sustain. Since late February, the bill to discount interest rate has dropped sharply, and has been inversely linked with the inter-bank certificate of deposit interest rate. The average interest margin in the past two weeks has reached - 45bp, which may have a great relationship with the credit scale of some banks. According to the credit demand index released by the central bank at the end of the quarter, the bill to discount interest rate is strongly related to the inter-bank certificate of deposit interest spread and the strength of credit demand, indicating that credit demand has declined again since late February. At present, the Federal Reserve is about to raise interest rates, and the European Central Bank will also speed up the end of the asset purchase plan than expected, which has a great impact on China's stable market expectations and is not conducive to the formation of capital depressions in China. At present, China still has some room to cut interest rates. We believe that the central bank may reverse market expectations and stabilize credit by means of refinancing and interest rate reduction.
Structural problems still exist, and there is a negative growth in resident credit. The negative growth of residents' credit in February was second only to the epidemic period in February 2020. At the same time, the negative growth of residents' medium and long-term loans was the first time since the data were available. Meanwhile, this month's credit data reflects the early characteristics of steady growth, that is, the proportion of enterprise credit and short-term loan is relatively high. In recent March, the proportion of corporate loans has reached 81%, and the proportion of short-term loans has reached 32%, which is close to the worst period of the epidemic in March 2020. In terms of regions, according to the new regional social finance data released by the central bank on February 20, 2022, the credit in North China and central and southern China was weak in the fourth quarter of 2021, the year-on-year growth rate was still in a negative range, and the credit scale gap between regions widened again, reaching 3.8 trillion yuan. Overall, except for East China and southwest China, the financing needs of other regions need to be boosted.
Government bonds will continue to form a certain support for social finance. The Spring Festival effect and the sharp decline in the scale of new credit led to a sharp decline of nearly 5 trillion yuan in the scale of new social finance this month, far exceeding the same period over the years. The growth rate of social finance fell back to 10.2% in February. By item, corporate bond financing increased significantly compared with the same period last year. At the same time, government bonds also played a certain supporting role in social finance. Due to the large maturity of treasury bonds in February and the significant decline in net financing, the supporting role of government bonds in social finance mainly depends on local government debt. As of March 11, according to the information disclosed by various provinces and cities, the planned issuance of special bonds in the first quarter of 2022 was about 1084.9 billion yuan, far higher than that in the same period last year. It is expected that government debt will continue to play a supporting role in social finance.
More real estate relaxation policies may be introduced in the future. The government work report proposes to "increase the proportion of first loan households" and explore new development models. At present, although there is no specific outline of the new development model, combined with the recent "good financial services for new citizens" mentioned by Guo Shuqing and the recent real estate policies and measures such as reducing housing loans or reducing the down payment ratio, the real estate policies may be further relaxed in the future.
Risk tip: the spread of the epidemic exceeded expectations, and China's foreign policies exceeded expectations
