Mortgage approvals for residential properties fell markedly in July compared to the previous month, according to statistics released yesterday by the Monetary Authority of Macao.
The figures show that banks approved nearly 29 percent fewer residential mortgages in July than they did in June.
The total value of residential mortgages approved stood at 1.2 billion patacas. In a rolling, three-month comparison, the monthly average of such mortgages approved between May and July was 1.84 billion patacas, down more than 6 percent from the previous three-month period of April to June.
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New commercial real estate loans increased by more than 30 percent month-on-month in July to stand at 2.31 billion patacas. However, in a rolling comparison, the monthly average of such borrowings approved between May and July was 2.62 billion patacas, down 0.6 percent from the April to June period.
At the end of July 2023, the delinquency ratio for residential mortgages stood at 0.7 percent, unchanged from a month ago but up 0.3 percentage points over a year earlier.
The delinquency ratio for commercial borrowings was 1.9 percent, up 0.1 percentage point from a month ago or 1.2 percentage points from the same month in 2022.
