China's Q4 GDP likely to grow 6.6%: UBS

BEIJING - Dragged down by a cooling property market and infrastructure investment, China's GDP growth is expected to dip to 6.6 percent in the fourth quarter of 2017, a UBS report said Friday.

GDP expanded 6.8 percent year on year in the third quarter, down from the second quarter's 6.9 percent increase but above the government's targeted growth of around 6.5 percent for the year.

UBS economist Wang Tao expects the country's economic growth to further moderate to 6.4 percent in 2018 as policies to curb speculation have cooled the property market while efforts to regulate local government borrowing activities might weigh on infrastructure investment.

Wang said the macroeconomic regulation policies should remain stable as economic growth will be underpinned by strong consumption expansion and improving exports.

Wang forecast new yuan-denominated loans extended by commercial banks to hit 900 billion yuan ($136.4 billion) in November, up from 663.2 billion yuan in October. That would make the aggregated new yuan loans in the first 11 months this year exceed the total of 2016.

The M2, a broad measure of money supply that covers cash in circulation and all deposits, was expected to rise 8.8 percent at the end of November, unchanged from the previous month and down from 11.4 percent during the same period last year, Wang said.

She said growth in the consumer price index, the main gauge of inflation, should hold steady at 1.9 percent in November, while that of producer price index should fall from 6.9 percent in October to 5.8 percent.