China Big-4 banks' Aug lending at 160 bln yuan -paper

SHANGHAI, Sept 3 (Reuters) - New lending by China's big four state-owned banks totalled 160 billion yuan ($23.4 billion) in August, the official China Securities Journal said on Thursday, citing data shared among the banks.

That was only slightly less than the roughly 165 billion yuan lent in July by the top four banks -- extending a sharp drop-off from previous months.

Banking sources had told Reuters on Tuesday that Chinese banks overall extended about 320 billion yuan in new loans in August, the lowest monthly total this year, according to preliminary data from the China Banking Regulatory Commission. [ID:nPEK91277]

The four big banks accounted for about 45 percent of total loans in the first half of the year.

Chinese bank lending has fallen sharply in the past two months, shrinking to 355.9 billion yuan in July from a monthly average of 1.23 trillion yuan in the first half.

The record first-half lending stirred fears that loans may be finding their way into asset market speculation and could lead to the formation of asset price bubbles.

The subsequent campdown, however, has helped to spur a sudden reversal in the Chinese stock market, where the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index .SSEC has tumbled more than 20 percent over the past month, after a 90 percent rally from the start of the year.

Thursday's China Securities Journal report also said Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (1398.HK) (601398.SS), the country's largest lender, issued new loans totalling 38.1 billion yuan in August, citing the bank's president Yang Kaisheng.

The four big state-owned banks are ICBC, Agricultural Bank of China [ABC.UL], Bank of China (3988.HK) (601988.SS) and China Construction Bank (0939.HK) (601939.SS). ($1=6.830 Yuan) (Reporting by Fang Yan Edmund Klamann; )