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Money Statistics for February 1995
According to statistics published today (Friday) by the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, most of the monetary aggregates recorded growth in February 1995 except cash held by the public and, hence, HK$MI, because of the post Lunar New Year effect. Foreign currency swap deposits continued to fall sharply reflecting the second stage of deregulation of the interest rate cap on HK dollar time deposits with effect from January 3, 1995.
Table 1 sets out summary figures for February 1995 and comparisons with earlier months.
Deposits
Total HK dollar deposits reversed the decline of 0.5% in January 1995 to rise by 2.1% in February 1995. All types of HK dollar deposits rose during the month. HK dollar demand deposits and savings deposits rose 4.8% and 0.6% respectively while the growth of HK dollar time deposits moderated from 2.4% in January to 2.2% in February.
The rise in HK dollar demand deposits and saving deposits which in aggregate amounted to HK$ 6.1 billion will have reflected the fall of HK$ 12.4 billion in cash held by the public, which largely reversed the rise of HK$ 16.2 billion in this item in January.
Foreign currency deposits also rebounded from a decline of 1.4% in January to an increase of 3.7% in February. The rise was mainly in US dollar deposits which increased by 6.2% while other. foreign currency deposits grew 0.9%.
Following a marked decrease of 13.7% in January, swap deposits continued to decline by 11.4% in February. This is mostly due to the second stage of the removal of HKAB's interest rate cap, as HK dollar time deposits have become a preferred alternative to foreign currency swap deposits.
Loans and Advances
Total outstanding loans and advances approved by Als expanded notably by 2.1% in February, up from 0.9% in January. Foreign currency loans grew particularly strongly during the month. The growth in HK dollar loans, however, moderated slightly from 0.8% in January to 0.7% in February.