China central bank says injected 180b yuan into interbank market in Jan via SLOs

[SHANGHAI] China's central bank announced details of the short-term liquidity operations (SLO) it conducted in January, revealing that it had used this mechanism to inject 180 billion yuan (US$28.70 billion) into the interbank money markets.

The injections occurred during mid-January, as the money rates climbed ahead of the long China's Lunar New Year holiday.

The People's Bank of China (PBOC) launched SLOs in 2013 to supplement its other monetary policy tools. The facility is mainly used to provide one- to three-day direct lines of credit to commercial banks, though loans with other maturities are occasionally used.

Unlike open market operations conducted via auction of central bank bills and bond repurchase agreements, SLOs are not publicly announced at the time they are conducted.

REUTERS