The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank just started their annual meeting on Tuesday in Tokyo with a pretty bleak message to the rest of the world. China’s major banks have confirmed they will not attend the meeting.
The banks include the country’s four state-owned banks -- the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China or ICBC, Bank of China, China Construction Bank, and the Agricultural Bank of China. The ICBC is the world’s largest lender by market value.
Meanwhile, the IMF’s official website says Zhou Xiaochuan, governor of the People’s Bank of China will make a speech on October 14th. However, the Chinese government has not released whether Zhou will attend the meeting.
According to China Daily, the banks’ decision was made after bilateral relations between China and Japan became strained, after the Japanese government announced its decision to "purchase" the Diaoyu Islands last month.
Meanwhile, the International Monetary Fund downgraded the forecast for global economic growth of 2012 in the World Economic Outlook before the IMF-World Bank 2012 annual meetings. It predicted China’s economy, the world’s second-biggest, will "soft land" by growing 7.8 percent this year and 8.2 percent next year.