Worries over China growth as July lending plunges

China's bank lending plunged in July as the weakening property sector hit demand for loans, statistics showed on Wednesday as other key indicators slowed, raising concerns for growth in the world's second-largest economy. Domestic banks' new yuan loans amounted to 385.2 billion yuan ($62.5 billion) last month, the People's Bank of China (PBoC) said in a statement, a drastic decline from June's 1.08 trillion yuan. Signs of strength in China's economy have been tempered by nagging worries over the potential for a downturn in the huge property sector to dampen growth. An official of the PBoC, China's central bank, attributed the fall in lending to the real estate market ‘undergoing some adjustments’ and ‘downward pressure in the domestic economy’. An independent survey of Chinese property prices showed their decline accelerated in July, dropping for the third straight month. China's economy grew a stronger-than-expected annualised 7.5 per cent in the April-June quarter, accelerating from 7.4 per cent during the first three months of the year, which was the worst since a similar expansion in July-September 2012. ANZ Bank economists Liu Li-Gang and Zhou Hao said the July lending data was a significant cause for concern, according to AFP.