The 24 authorised institutions participating in the Monetary Authority's monthly survey of residential mortgage lending reported a 9.8% fall in new loans drawn down during January, to $12.4 billion. New loans approved by the institutions fell 2.4% to $14.8 billion.

Within this total, approvals for primary market transactions rose $900 million (37.5%) while approvals for secondary market transactions fell $900 million (11%) and refinancings $400 million (8.7%). The average contractual life of newly approved loans rose to 238 months, the longest since mid-1998.

The proportion of new approvals priced at more than 2.5% below the best lending rate rose to 90.1% from 87.2% in December last year, while that for fixed rate mortgages contracted further to 0.1%. The outstanding amount of mortgage loans stood at $529 billion, up $1 billion on the previous month.