SHANGHAI (Reuters) – China’s central bank will conduct medium-term lending facility (MLF) operations on Wednesday, traders with direct knowledge of the matter said.
There is no MLF loans due to expire on the day, though a batch of 200 billion yuan ($28.39 billion) worth of such loans is maturing on Friday.
Markets will closely watch the interest rate on the fresh MLF loan injection to gauge the People’s Bank of China’s (PBOC) monetary policy stance, after it lowered the 7-day reverse repo rate by 20 basis points in late March.
The MLF now acts as a guide for the PBOC’s new lending benchmark Loan Prime Rate (LPR).
The one-year MLF rate
(Reporting by the Shanghai Newsroom; Editing by Shri Navaratnam)
