China’s new bank card limit ‘not targeted at Macau,’ analyst says

Authorities in mainland China rolled out a new policy limiting the amount of money that people can withdraw from their accounts while overseas.

On Saturday, China’s State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) announced that the annual limit of bank card withdrawals has been updated to RMB100,000 (USD15,000) per customer. This replaces the old policy of RMB100,000 per account per year.

The old policy did not stop people from having multiple supplementary cards attached to their main account as well as using multiple accounts with different banks. The new rules, however, will apply to all bank cards and accounts that an individual has, according to the government agency.

In a statement, SAFE also warned people against borrowing others’ bank cards or lending their own bank cards to circumvent the new rules. Those who have exceeded the annual quota will be suspended from holding domestic bank cards to withdraw cash outside China.