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The China Construction Bank (CCB) announced Thursday that its first quarter non-performing loan (NPLs) rate was reduced to 14.05 percent, down 1.85 percentage points from the beginning of the year.
A spokesman for the CCB said that in the first three months of this year, the bank had handled 16.774 billion yuan (about US$2.03 billion) in NPLs, recovering 8.827 billion yuan, including 8.392 billion yuan in liquid assets.
In accordance with the requirements of the central bank, the four State-owned commercial banks have to lower their NPLs to less than 15 percent by 2005, he noted. With the lowest rate of NPLs, the CCB is likely to become the first to reach that target.
He said that the CCB plans to handle 45 billion yuan in NPLs this year and will do its utmost to recover 20 billion yuan in cash. He predicted that, by the end of this year, the NPL rate will be lowered by four percentage points, and in two to three years, the rate will be less than 10 percent.
(Xinhua News Agency April 25, 2003)
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