The 24 authorised institutions that participate in the HK Monetary Authority's monthly survey of residential mortgage lending reported an increase of 13% in new loans drawn down during November, to $13.9 billion, the highest level since mid-1999.

Driven by more approvals for transactions in the secondary market and refinancing loans, during the month the institutions' approved new loans rose 3.1% in number terms.

Mainly due to the smaller loan size of the new approvals, a drop of 5.1% to $14.9 billion was recorded in value. The number of new loan applications dropped 1.9% after rising for three consecutive months.

The proportion of new loan approvals priced at more than 2.5% below the best lending rate edged up to 86.4% from 86.2% in October, while that for fixed-rate mortgages contracted, to 1.2% from 2.2% in October.

The outstanding amount of mortgage loans increased to $527 billion.