China Money Rate Declines for a Fifth Day on PBOC Easing Signs

China’s benchmark money-market rate fell for a fifth day, the longest run of declines in two months, on signs the central bank is adding funds selectively to ease a cash squeeze.

In the past two days, about 30 transactions for overnight loans in the interbank market were recorded in the final 90 minutes of trading in Shanghai at rates of between 3.5 percent and 4 percent, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Those were the lowest levels of each day and compared with the average rate of 5.46 percent. The People’s Bank of China signaled this week that while it won’t let the cash crunch roil money markets, any liquidity support will be focused on banks that are lending to help the economy.