SHANGHAI/BEIJING, June 27 (Reuters) - China's major state-owned banks were seen selling dollars in the offshore spot foreign exchange market on Tuesday, four sources with knowledge of the matter said, suggesting authorities wanted to slow the pace of the yuan's recent slide.
Such state bank dollar selling appeared as the offshore yuan weakened towards the psychologically important 7.25 per dollar level, two of the sources said.
"The 7.25 (yuan per dollar) level remains a key threshold," said one of them, adding a breach of the level could quickly send the yuan to lows last seen in 2022.
The yuan's value onshore hit a trough of 7.3280 per dollar in November, levels last seen during the 2008 global financial crisis, while the offshore yuan dropped to a record low of 7.3746.
[CNY/]Several currency traders also said they saw state banks selling dollars on Monday just ahead of the onshore domestic close (0830 GMT) to shore up the yuan's closing price, as the rate could determine the next day's official guidance rate.
Persons:
China's, Kim Coghill, Vidya Ranganathan
Organizations:
People's Bank of China, UBS, Federal Reserve, Thomson
Locations:
SHANGHAI, BEIJING, United States, Shanghai, Beijing