China's top 5 banks triple debt write-downs to avoid defaults — RT Business

China's top 5 banks triple debt write-downs to avoid defaults — RT Business:

"Five of China’s biggest banks have tripled the size of debt forgiveness to the country’s enterprises in the first six months of the year. The world’s biggest foreign lender is now seeking to avoid a wave of domestic defaults.

The world’s most profitable lender, Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd, together with its four biggest domestic rivals, wrote down a total of 22.1 billion yuan ($3.65 billion) of debt, a threefold increase on the 7.65 billion yuan last year, Bloomberg reports.

The move came as a part of China’s overall initiative to make the banking buffers more crisis-proof. Earlier in April the China Banking Regulatory Commission urged banks to set aside more funds, write off bad loans, as well as cut dividend payments in order to be ready for domestic defaults.

Despite the latest data showed the country’s GDP rebounded to 7.8 percent in the third quarter, worries about the slowdown persist. Officially, growth will slow this year to 7.6 percent, its lowest since 1999."

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