Banks still wary of small-business loans as PBOC speeds targeted measures

Interest-rate cuts from China’s central bank have done little thus far to make credit more accessible for the small firms that Beijing has posited are central to its shift toward a consumption-driven economy, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing analysts and economists. To encourage risk-averse banks to lend to smaller-scale firms the People’s Bank of China will accelerate “targeted” measures in the months ahead by giving banks more liquidity–provided they lend more to said companies, according to central bank officials and economists. But even these measures may not be effective, as tailored measures taken to date have yet to pay off in any meaningful way for small corporate borrowers.