BEIJING China's falling foreign exchange purchases could pressure the central bank to further lower banks' reserve requirements next year, an ex-central banker said on Sunday.
Wu Xiaoling, a former deputy central bank governor, said at a forum that further cuts in reserve requirements in China do not indicate a shift in monetary policy stance.
The central bank has said it is keeping policy prudent in 2012, even though many economists believe it shifted to a looser policy stance when it cut banks' reserve requirements in November for the first time in three years.
Many analysts see China's foreign exchange purchases as a proxy for foreign capital entering the country, and they believe the drop in purchases in recent months suggest some speculators are pulling out funds as the world economy wobbles.
(Reporting by Aileen Wang and Koh Gui Qing)
