Briefly

PBOC conducts 5b yuan bills swap

The People's Bank of China, the country's central bank, conducted this year's seventh central bank bills swap operation on Friday to improve the liquidity of perpetual bonds issued by commercial banks. The CBS, valued at 5 billion yuan ($741.43 million), is open to primary dealers for bidding at a fixed rate of 0.1 percent, the central bank said in a statement. The swap will be due on Oct 29. The CBS program allows dealers to swap the perpetual bonds they hold for central bank bills, which will boost market demand for perpetual bonds but have a neutral impact on liquidity in the banking system. Perpetual bonds are fixed-income securities with no maturity date and are not redeemable but pay a steady stream of interest in perpetuity.

Logistics flow sees improvements

China has made steady progress in ensuring smooth logistics and freight transportation over the past three months, the Ministry of Transport said. "Expressways, ports and waterways across the nation have operated smoothly," said Wang Xiuchun, an official with the ministry, adding the number of trucks on expressways on July 26 rose 10.3 percent from April 18. Key logistic indicators reported stable growth, Wang said. Since July, China's rail cargo volume, cargo throughput at major ports and business volume of its postal industry all exceeded figures recorded in the same period in 2019, respectively.

Export credit insurer grows steadily

China's only policy-oriented insurer specializing in export credit insurance reported steady business growth in the first half of this year. The China Export & Credit Insurance Corp, also known as Sinosure, said it had underwritten $445.13 billion worth of insured businesses during the period, up 11.8 percent year-on-year. Sinosure said it served nearly 164,000 clients, up 15.2 percent year-on-year.

Xinhua - China Daily