BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s new home prices fell for a fourth straight month in November, dragged down by a sluggish economy and a still weak property sector, official data showed on Thursday, but recent favorable policies and easing
New home prices fell 0.2% mom in November after falling 0.3% in October, according to Reuters calculations based on National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) data.
Prices fell by 1.6% year-on-year, the seventh consecutive month of decline. Prices fell 1.6% year-on-year in October.
China rolled out a series of measures to support its struggling real estate sector, which has been squeezed by a liquidity crunch. The measures include lifting a year-long ban on listed real estate companies raising capital through stock offerings.
The sector was once a major engine of growth but has been hit by multiple crises since the authorities started cracking down on real estate mid-term 2020 Over-leveraged, funding Nervous developers defaulted on debt and halted construction, prompting homebuyers to resist mortgage payments.
Beijing has ordered four state-owned banks to issue offshore loans to help developers repay overseas debt, its top source told Reuters, in Beijing’s latest backing for the industry. The real estate sector has benefited as the country moves away from a zero-COVID policy that required economically damaging lockdowns and mandatory quarantines of government facilities.
Nomura analysts wrote in a note that they had raised their 2023 growth forecast to 4.8% from 4.0% %.
“Ending zero COVID is both necessary and inevitable and a prerequisite for economic growth recovery,” Nomura analysts said. “However, we continue to warn that the road to full reopening is likely to remain painful and bumpy.”
