The auto industry will be next, He Yanli, a vice-director at the National Development and Reform Commission, told Dow Jones Newswires yesterday.

Car sales in the first three months this year rose 74 per cent from the same period a year earlier to 890,000 units, Xinhua News Agency reported earlier this month, citing data from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers.

Fuelled by growing lending and a swelling trade surplus, China's money supply, or M2 a broad measure of cash in circulation and in deposits climbed 18.8 per cent on a year-on-year basis to 31.1 trillion yuan (US$3.9 trillion) at the end of March.

Outstanding local currency loans in all financial institutions topped 20.6 trillion yuan (US$2.6 trillion) during the same period, up 14.7 per cent on a yearly basis.

"The lending rate hike is aimed at maintaining the sound momentum of the continuous, co-ordinated and healthy economic growth," the central bank said in the statement posted on its website.