China records robust momentum in financing activity

China's financing activity posted robust momentum at the start of the year as the country's aggregate social financing — the total amount of financing to the real economy — stood at 15.18 trillion yuan ($2.08 trillion) in the first quarter of the year, up by 2.37 trillion yuan from the same period of last year, official data showed.

The People's Bank of China, the country's central bank, said on Sunday that the country's outstanding aggregate social financing totaled 422.96 trillion yuan as of the end of last month, marking an 8.4 percent year-on-year increase. The growth rate was up from 8.2 percent for the January-February period.

The country's new yuan-denominated loans came in at 9.78 trillion yuan in the three months of the year, the PBOC said. This marks an increase of 3.4 percent from 9.46 trillion yuan seen in the same period of last year.

The broad money supply, or M2, reached 326.06 trillion yuan at the end of March, up 7 percent year-on-year, the same growth rate as a month earlier.