China Signals New Measures to Support Economic Growth

China's State Council said in a statement that it will introduce a package of policies to bolster the economy, stabilize the property market, encourage consumer spending and reverse declining infrastructure investment.

Policymakers will also consider new measures to create more jobs and raise household incomes. Beijing introduced its first national-level home mortgage subsidies this week to support first-time homebuyers.

And the People's Bank of China simultaneously cut its one-year "pledged supplementary lending" rate by a quarter point to 1.5 percent and extended coverage under that rate to new infrastructure, including water networks and computing power grids.

The central bank also increased its relending quota for innovative science and technology projects to 1.4 trillion yuan (US$208.8 billion), and expanded the quota for loans to small businesses and the agricultural sector to 4.9 trillion yuan. The largely targeted stimulus program is expected to underpin the government goal of achieving economic growth this year of between 4.5 percent and 5 percent.

Separately, the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou became the third major metropolis to reform its commercial housing sales system. New rules cap what a real estate developer can collect as downpayment for a completed-home sale to 5 percent, compared with 1 percent in Beijing and 3 percent in Shanghai. Land-transfer payments will require a downpayment of no less than 50 percent, with the balance payable within one year.