China’s central bank said on Friday it lent 208 billion yuan ($31.2 billion) to financial institutions via its medium-term lending facility in June, Reuters reported. Outstanding MLF was 1.75 trillion yuan at end-June compared with 1.64 trillion yuan at end-May, the People’s Bank of China said in a statement on its website. The bank lent 123.20 billion yuan for three months, 11.50 billion yuan for six months and 73.30 billion yuan for one year. Interest rates for the MLF loans were unchanged at 2.75% for three-month loans, 2.85% for six-month loans and 3% for one-year loans, the central bank said. Meanwhile, the yuan weakened for a fourth week on speculation that the authorities are allowing the currency to drop. The Chinese currency fell 0.2% to 6.659 per dollar in Shanghai, taking this week’s loss to 0.5%. It fell earlier to a five-year low of 6.662.
