According to statistics released today by the Monetary Authority of Macao, broad money supply continued to fall in March, with the share of patacas remained stable.  On the other hand, resident deposits dropped from a month earlier whereas loans to residents posted an increase.

Money supply

Currency in circulation and demand deposits dropped 2.1% and 0.7% respectively.  M1 thus decreased 1.0% from one month earlier.  Meanwhile, quasi-monetary liabilities edged down 0.2%.  The sum of these two items, i.e. M2, decreased 0.3% to MOP604.2 billion.  On an annual basis, M1 and M2 grew 9.5% and 10.4% respectively.  The shares of pataca (MOP), Hong Kong dollar (HKD), renminbi (RMB) and United States dollar (USD) in M2 were 31.1%, 53.9%, 4.5% and 8.6% respectively.

Deposits

Resident deposits dropped 0.3% from the preceding month to MOP588.3 billion while non-resident deposits also fell 3.8% to MOP245.1 billion.  Meanwhile, public sector deposits with the banking sector decreased 0.7% to MOP196.0 billion.  As a result, total deposits in the banking sector dropped 1.2% from a month earlier to MOP1,029.5 billion.  The shares of MOP, HKD, RMB and USD in total deposits were 20.3%, 51.7%, 3.9% and 20.6% respectively.

Loans

Domestic loans to the private sector grew 0.2% from a month ago to MOP463.5 billion.  Among which, MOP139.3 billion was MOP-denominated, MOP301.7 billion was denominated in HKD, MOP0.3 billion was denominated in RMB and MOP19.3 billion was denominated in USD, representing 30.1%, 65.1%, 0.1% and 4.2% of the total respectively .  Analysed by economic sector, “electricity, gas and water” and “restaurants, hotels and similar” increased at respective rates of 26.5% and 7.8% compared with a quarter ago, whereas “transport, warehouse and communications” and “construction and public works” dropped 22.2% and 8.7% respectively.

External loans grew 4.8% to MOP466.3 billion; of which, loans denominated in MOP, HKD, RMB and USD accounted for 1.9% (MOP9.1 billion), 32.9% (MOP153.3 billion), 8.2% (MOP38.5 billion) and 50.4% (MOP234.8 billion) respectively.

Operating ratios

At end-March, the loan-to-deposit ratio for the resident sector rose from 58.7% at end-February to 59.1%.  Meanwhile, the ratio for both the resident and non-resident sectors also grew from 87.1% to 90.3%.  Both the one-month and three-month current assets to liabilities ratios stayed at relatively high levels of 51.7% and 51.4% respectively.  Concurrently, the non-performing loan ratio remained virtually stable at 0.2%.