New home mortgages in Shanghai rose in May from April in line with an accelerating growth in loans in the city, the Shanghai headquarters of the People's Bank of China said yesterday.
Home mortgages are "slightly speeding up" as banks lent 4.96 billion yuan ($799 million) to individuals in May, 1 billion yuan more than April's, the PBOC's Shanghai headquarters said in a statement.
But the amount was 1.32 billion yuan less than May last year.
The month-on-month rise was in line with a recovery in home sales after the government eased curbs on mortgage applications and the PBOC cut interest rates on May 10 for the third time in six months to lower funding costs for the economy.
The city's housing market recovered in April as home sales by area fell 8 percent in the first four months of this year, an improvement from a steep 16 percent drop in the first three months, data from the Shanghai Statistics Bureau showed.
On March 31, China allowed second-home buyers to borrow more from banks in a bid to boost housing demand and spur economic growth.
But the effects of the latest interest rate cut on mortgages may take time to filter through as it takes banks a month to approve a mortgage.
Overall, banks in Shanghai extended 53.52 billion yuan in new local currency loans in May, up 28.03 billion yuan from May last year, the statement said.
