Beijing - China's central bank lowered its interest rate Wednesday - the fourth time since mid-September - to help ease the impact of the global financial crisis and aid economic growth.

The People's Bank of China said the benchmark rates for one-year loans and deposits will both fall by 1.08 percentage points, bringing the cost of one-year borrowing to
5.58 per cent and one-year deposit rates to 2.52 per cent.

The central bank also slashed the reserve requirements by 1 percentage point for six big banks, down from 17 per cent, and by 2 percentage points for smaller banks, down from 16 per cent.

The move was more aggressive than predicted by analysts and comes a day after the World Bank predicted a reduced economic growth in 2009 for China.

The World Bank lowered its 2009 economic growth forecast for China from 9.2 per cent to 7.5 per cent Tuesday, a drop to a similar level to the 7.6 per cent posted in 1999. (dpa)