China's new yuan-denominated lending in November rebounded slightly to 294.8 billion yuan (43.2 billion U.S. dollars) from October's 253 billion yuan, the People's Bank of China, the central bank, said Friday.

The November figure brought new yuan-denominated loans in the first 11 months to 9.21 trillion yuan, 5.06 trillion yuan more than the corresponding period last year.

In November's new lending, about a third was offered by the nation's top four state-owned banks, said a report released Friday by the Bank of Communications (BOCOM), China's fifth largest lender.

"Small and medium-sized banks, especially local banks have played a major role in new lending in November," the report said.

The BOCOM report forecast new lending next month would be about the same as that in November at between 250 billion to 300 billion yuan.

It also forecast new loans for 2010 was likely to reach about 8 trillion yuan as infrastructure projects under construction would need more funding and exports began recovering.

China's banking authorities had vowed to step up efforts to improve credit quality, and keep credit expansion at a "reasonable" pace after record lending.

"Bank lending this year has largely gone to basic infrastructure building, such as railway, road and airport construction projects. China needs to expand credit to small and medium-sized companies." said Zhuang Jian, a senior economist with the Asian Development Bank.

The broad measure of money supply, M2, which covers cash in circulation and all deposits, rose 29.74 percent from a year earlier to 59.46 trillion yuan at the end of November.

The narrow measure of money supply, M1 (cash in circulation plus current corporate deposits), was up 34.63 percent to 21.25 trillion yuan.

Renminbi deposits were up by 582.4 billion yuan in November, bringing the rise for the first 11 months to 12.63 trillion yuan, 5.32 trillion yuan more than the corresponding period last year.

Personal loans in November rose by 237.7 billion yuan, with 201.2 billion yuan being long-term and medium-term loans.

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