AsianFin -- China’s central bank launched a facility it promised to tap into to shore up the stock market.

Credit：Xinhua News Agency

The People's Bank of China (PBOC) announced Thursday it introduced a facility called Securities, Funds and Insurance companies Swap Facility, or SFISF, to allow eligible securities firms, funds, insurance companies to exchange for high quality liquidity assets like treasury bonds from the central bank using various collateral assets such as bonds, equity exchange traded funds (ETFs) and holdings in constituents of CSI 300 index, which tracks the top 300 stocks traded on the Shanghai Stock Exchange and the Shenzhen Stock Exchange.

The SFISF was created to promote the sound and stable development of the capital market in response to requirements of the Third Plenary Session of the 20th Cntral Committee of the Communist Party of China in July, according to a statement Thursday. The PBOC said in the statement it initially injected RMB500 billion for the new swap facility and the scale could be expanded if needed in the future.

The SFISF, with the term no more than a year, can be extended upon expiration if application approved and the scope of eligible collateral may be expanded in the future if necessary, Chinese news outlet Yicai cited people close to the central bank. The facility thus has a huge room for maneuver given these operational flexibility. The central bank will conduct operations of the SFISF through specific primary dealers, Yicai reported, noting that one of them may be China Bond Insurance Co.,Ltd., a provider of corporate credit enhancement services, based on the list of primary dealers.

The new swap facility is part of its biggest stimulus since the Covid-19 pandemic the PBOC announced on September 24. The central bank will create new monetary policy tools to support the stable development of the stock market, said Pan Gongsheng, governor of the PBOC, at a press conference that day. The central bank will establish a swap program for securities, funds and insurance companies to obtain liquidity from the central bank through asset collateralization.

The program will significantly enhance companies' ability to acquire funds and increase their stock holdings, Pan said. He revealed that the PBOC planned a RMB500 billion swap facility initially, and it can  be followed by another RMB500 billion , even the third version of the facility with RMB500 billion as long as it works well.

 The central bank will also create a special re-lending facility to guide banks to provide loans to listed companies and their major shareholders for buybacks and increasing shareholdings, he said.

China would cut the reserve requirement ratio (RRR) by a half percentage points, or 50 BPs, in the near future, providing about RMB 1 trillion in long-term liquidity to the financial market, said Pan. Depending on the liquidity situation in the market, RRR may be further lowered by 25 to 50 BPs within the year, Pan said. The central bank will also reduce the interest rate of seven-day reverse repurchases from 1.7% to 1.5%, according to Pan.   

The reduction was aimed at guiding the loan prime rate and deposit rate to move downward and maintaining stability in the net interest margin of commercial banks, said Pan.

Pan also announced China’s biggest package yet to boost its property market. He said China will lower mortgage rates on existing home loans to a level similar to those of newly issued housing loans. The average reduction in mortgage rates for existing home loans is expected to be around 50 BPs, he said. 

"The new policy, which is conducive to further reducing borrowers' mortgage interest expenses, is expected to benefit 50 million households, or a population of 150 million," said Pan. This move is expected to reduce the total interest expenses for households by approximately RMB150 billion per year on average, which will help boost consumption and investment, Pan added.

China is expected to unveil more stimulus in the coming months as the PBOC said the domestic RRR has dropped to 6.6% following the latest adjustment, which still provide some room to the central bank for further cuts compared with major overseas counterparts.