New loans extended in the first month of 2012 are expected to hit a little more than 1 trillion yuan ($157.9 billion), similar to the same period last year, China Times reported Sunday.

The January figure will be in accordance with the government's annual target of 8 trillion yuan, the report said.

In the first three weeks of January, the People's Bank of China, the central bank, increased the liquidity by releasing 477 billion yuan to the market through open-market operations, which released the pressure of the inter-bank repo market and made the adjustment of the reserve requirement ratio (RRR) less urgent, according to the report.

However, in February, the possibility of lowering the reserve requirement ratio will be greatly increased as the liquidity will be soaked up by the central bank at the beginning of February, the newspaper said.