Yuan loans made up 41.9 percent of the new financing that China’s real economy received in the first nine months of 2026, according to the People’s Bank of China (PBOC). The central bank’s figures show aggregate financing to the real economy (AFRE), also called total social financing, rose by 27.46 trillion yuan from January to September. That was 2.63 trillion yuan less than in the same period of 2025. The PBOC published the data on 14 October 2026, and the 41.9 percent share appears in its third-quarter monetary policy report, released on 11 November 2026. As of 12 November, the PBOC’s statistics pages did not yet list October 2026 figures.

Where the new financing came from

The PBOC lists these amounts for January to September 2026:

  • Yuan loans to the real economy: up 11.5 trillion yuan, 3.04 trillion yuan less than a year earlier.
  • Government bonds: net financing of 10.3 trillion yuan, down 1.16 trillion yuan year on year.
  • Corporate bonds: net financing of 2.75 trillion yuan, up 1.18 trillion yuan.
  • Domestic equity of non-financial companies: 535.9 billion yuan, up 219.1 billion yuan.

As shares of the 27.46 trillion yuan total, government bonds were 37.5 percent, corporate bonds 10.0 percent and equity 2.0 percent (Lens arithmetic). For the same months of 2025, using the year-earlier amounts implied by the PBOC’s year-on-year changes, loans were 48.3 percent, government bonds 38.1 percent, corporate bonds 5.2 percent and equity 1.1 percent (Lens arithmetic). The PBOC table also lists foreign-currency loans, entrusted and trust loans, undiscounted bankers’ acceptances, asset-backed securities of deposit-taking institutions and loan write-offs.

Earlier in the year the loan share was higher. In the first quarter, yuan loans were 8.9 trillion yuan of 14.83 trillion yuan in new AFRE, or 60.0 percent, against 63.9 percent a year earlier (Lens arithmetic from PBOC data). Yicai Global reported the same 60 percent and 63.9 percent figures in April, and said corporate bonds rose to 7.1 percent of new financing from 3.5 percent. In July, new yuan loans fell by about 340 billion yuan (Lens arithmetic: 10.38 trillion yuan for January to July minus 10.72 trillion yuan for January to June).

The outstanding stock

At the end of September 2026, outstanding AFRE stood at 468.17 trillion yuan, up 7.1 percent year on year, according to the PBOC. By component:

  • Yuan loans: 279.9 trillion yuan, or 59.8 percent of the total, down 1.3 percentage points from a year earlier.
  • Government bonds: 105.23 trillion yuan, 22.5 percent, up 1.3 points.
  • Corporate bonds: 36.62 trillion yuan, 7.8 percent, up 0.1 points.
  • Non-financial companies’ domestic equity: 12.73 trillion yuan, 2.7 percent, down 0.1 points.

The monetary policy report says direct financing, meaning corporate bonds, government bonds and domestic equity, was about 33 percent of the stock at the end of September, 1.4 percentage points higher than a year earlier. In the PBOC’s monthly releases, the loan share of the stock was 60.7 percent at the end of 2025, 60.9 percent at end-January, 60.7 percent at end-March, 60.1 percent at end-July and 59.8 percent at end-September.

The 2025 baseline

For all of 2025, the PBOC reported AFRE of 35.6 trillion yuan. Yuan loans to the real economy were 15.91 trillion yuan, government bonds 13.84 trillion yuan, corporate bonds 2.39 trillion yuan and equity 476.3 billion yuan. By Lens arithmetic, loans were 44.7 percent of the total and bonds plus equity 46.9 percent. On 16 September 2026, The Standard reported, in an article about a Qiushi journal piece by PBOC Governor Pan Gongsheng, that the central bank put the 2025 shares at 45 percent for loans and 47 percent for bond and equity financing combined, the first time the second group was larger.

A separate banking measure, new yuan loans, totalled 16.27 trillion yuan in 2025, according to the PBOC. Yicai Global reported this was 1.82 trillion yuan less than in 2024. This measure is not the same as AFRE loans: the PBOC’s breakdown of it includes loans to non-bank financial institutions.

A State Council report on financial work, delivered to the national legislature’s standing committee on 3 November 2026 and posted by the PBOC, said AFRE rose by 33 trillion yuan between October 2025 and September 2026. Over the same period, it said, 88 companies listed on the Shanghai and Shenzhen A-share markets and raised 247.2 billion yuan, and listed companies raised another 776.9 billion yuan through follow-on offerings.

Sources and notes

Read in full: the PBOC’s English Financial Statistics Report (Q1-Q3 2026). Read in part (financing sections): its July 2026, Q1 2026, January 2026, 2025 and H1 2026 reports; the Chinese-language 2026 third-quarter monetary policy report (41.9 percent and 33 percent figures, Table 1); and the State Council report on financial work as posted by the PBOC. Also read in full: Yicai Global on first-quarter loan shares (14 April 2026) and on 2025 data (16 January 2026); and The Standard (16 September 2026). Lens did not read Governor Pan’s Qiushi article itself. October 2026 data had not been published on the PBOC site when this was written. A metal.com (SMM) headline on the September release gave 2.746 trillion yuan for AFRE and 1.152 trillion yuan for new loans; the PBOC release gives 27.46 trillion yuan and 11.52 trillion yuan, and Lens used the PBOC figures. Year-earlier shares for 2025 were derived from the PBOC’s year-on-year changes, not from a separate 2025 release. Thumbnail photo: “People's Bank of China Headquarter, Beijing” by Max12Max via Wikimedia Commons, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0; cropped. The People's Bank of China headquarters in Beijing, with the national flag flying in front of the main entrance. Illustrative photo.

Image: Lens chart built from the figures above. Thumbnail: Max12Max via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0).