In the first seven months of the current year, land area sold in 40 major Chinese cities amounted to 256.656 million square meters, up 1.0 percent year on year.
In July of the current year, land area sold in 40 major Chinese cities was down 8.0 percent month on month, while up 7.0 percent year on year, as announced by CRIC, a real estate research institute of E-House, a Shanghai-based real estate transaction service provider.
The margins between land sales prices (via auction) and land cost prices declined for the third consecutive month: for instance, the margins in July for the first and second-tier cities were 12.0 percent, decreases compared to previous months.
The Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party emphasized again in late July that houses are for living in instead of for investing. Later in early August, China’s Central Bank required the real estate industry to maintain a reasonable and moderate increase in personal housing loans, and prohibit consumer loans from being used for house purchases in violation of regulations.
CRIC forecasts that some of the cities in China where the real estate market has been most active are likely to tighten regulatory policies for real estate, which will cool down the real estate industry for the whole country, thereby exerting a negative impact on demand for rebar and wire rod as housing construction is a major consumer of rebar and wire rod.