Developer default not to stop property market pickup

Guotai Junan said it is still optimistic about the credit conditions of Chinese property developers and the investment opportunity of newly issued bonds in the sector.

The positive sentiment is echoed by many other analysts.

Zhang Dawei, chief analyst at real estate agency Centaline Property, said property market transactions heated up in the last quarter thanks to the government policy to loosen lending restrictions and a cut of interest rates by the central bank.

Centaline data showed the home sales of 54 cities in December reached 318,000 units, the highest monthly figure in 2014.

The rising trend is likely to continue in the first half of 2015, said Zhang.

Bank of Communications said in a report that China's property sector is bidding farewell to the "golden era" of high-speed expansion and entering a "silver era" of slower growth.

The market situation is transforming from short housing supply to basically balanced supply and demand, due to slowdown in China's urbanization process, relatively high inventory level and structural oversupply, the bank said.

With accumulative effects of favorable policies and sufficient liquidity, the housing market will see a soft landing and a rebound in sales and investment will be seen in 2015, according to the bank.

"However, the market will not recover its red-hot period of growth from 2009 to 2012," it added.