MNI China Press Digest Nov 22: Credit Lending, Yuan, Inflation

The following lists highlights from Chinese press reports on Monday:

• The People's Bank of China may be more active in boosting social financing and ensuring liquidity, the Economic Information Daily said commenting the central bank's Q3 monetary report. The PBOC removed its oft-repeated phrases in the Q3 report, including "not engaging in flooding-style" credit stimulus and "controlling overall monetary floodgate," said the newspaper owned by Xinhua News Agency. The central bank also showed structural loosening policy intention, it said. While developed economies have started peripheral tightening, China won't follow but will instead shift to more pro-growth given its worsening slowdown and expected fall in inflation, said the daily.
• The yuan is likely to maintain its recent strength in the near term supported by China's strong exports, businesses' demand for converting their forex holdings and the easing of relations with the U.S. after the video summit between the two presidents, the official Economic Daily said in its frontpage citing analyst Wang Qing of Golden Credit Rating. The Chinese currency broke the 6.37 resistance and now trades the highest since June 1, while the dollar index also strengthened. However, the yuan may not be on an appreciation path given China is likely to pursue a degree of structural loosening to support its growth while the U.S. begins tapering, said the newspaper.
• China's consumer price inflation is mostly under control, and it won't see wide-scale price increases, the National Development and Reform Commission said in a WeChat blogpost. Food prices can be contained given China's increased grain harvest and rising pork supply, Guo Liyan, a researcher at a research body affiliated with the NDRC, said in the blogpost. China's current logistics are functioning well, so transportation snags are unlikely despite snow and outbreaks of animal diseases in some regions, Guo said. While the prices of raw materials such as coal may continue rising in the near term, China has released some production capacities and reserves to guide the market, which limited industrial price gains, the blogpost said.