Credit growth slowed in April, but loans to residential property investors, which is most worrying the Reserve Bank, are still growing strongly.
The value of credit on the books of Australian lenders rose 0.3 per cent in April, according to the seasonally adjusted figures from the central bank.
Annual credit growth was 6.1 per cent, the fourth month in a row the annual pace narrowly beat six per cent.
Two years ago the annual growth rate was just 3.1 per cent, and one year ago it was 4.6 per cent.
This acceleration has only lifted credit growth to a sedate pace though, still less than half the 12.5 per cent average over the decade before the global crisis in 2008.
Most categories of credit are even more sedate - owner-occupier housing loans are up only 5.7 per cent over the year to April, other personal credit is up just 0.6 per cent in that period, and business credit in April was up just five per cent from a year earlier.
However, loans to housing investors are up 10.4 per cent.
That's just above the 10 per cent speed limit imposed in December - if only via a sternly worded letter - by the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority.
But APRA's admonishment, and possibly a recognition of the growing risks in sections of the housing market by lenders themselves, may be having an effect.
While the annual growth rate was just over the regulator's line in the sand, the growth rate over the most recent six months works out to exactly 10 per cent in annualised terms.
Growth over the most recent three months was a touch slower, an annualised pace of 9.8 per cent.
The rise in April itself, a sliver under 0.8 per cent, was in line with that growth rate.
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