All Chinese banks will meet the 8 percent capital adequacy ratio (CAR) requirement this year, Liu Mingkang, head of the China Banking Regulatory Commission (CBRC), told an annual financial conference.

By the end of the third quarter, 136 commercial banks had reached or surpassed the CAR requirement.

Liu, speaking on Monday at Caijing magazine's annual conference here, said that the competitiveness of China's banking industry had improved significantly due to the increase in the CAR and a decline in non-performing loans.

It was reported earlier that urban commercial banks' average CAR had risen to 8.6 percent from -1.6 percent at the end of 2003.

The non-performing loan ratio had declined to 6.63 percent at the end of the third quarter this year, Liu said.

Rural cooperative banking institutions reported 183.1 billion yuan ($24.81 billion) in combined net assets, with an average CAR of 9.1 percent, up from -6.8 percent four years ago.