Chinese banks told to halt lending

Beijing has ordered commercial banks to stop lending until the end of  January, Bloomberg reported, citing state media. The China Securities Journal cited unidentified banking industry sources in both Beijing and Shanghai as saying that new loans amounting to more than US$146 billion have already been issued in 2010. The newspaper quoted an unnamed Bank of China official who said that the national bank’s branch managers had told sub-branches to halt new lending until the end of the month. Meanwhile Liu Mingkang, chairman of the China Banking Regulatory Commission, said that Chinese regulators had asked some banks to limit lending, without identifying specific banks. “We have a number of regulatory requirements to ensure prudent supervision,” Liu said. “For those that failed to meet these standards, we told them to limit lending.” China’s banks extended US$1.4 trillion in new loans last year to help finance the nation’s stimulus package.