Shares of China's Industrial Bank Co. closed down 2.38 percent at 34.8 yuan on its lower target for lending increases in 2010.

The lender targeted its growth rate of its outstanding loans for 2010 at 22 percent, compared with the 40.5 percent rise in 2009, due to tighter credit control by the central government as the country faces increasing inflationary pressures, said the bank in a statement filed to the Shanghai Stock Exchange late Wednesday.

Net profits of the Fuzhou-based bank in 2009 climbed 16.6 percent on the back of surging loans, up 40.5 percent from a year earlier to 701.6 billion yuan, according to the statement.

The bank attributed its net profit rise mainly to a 3.85 percent rise of interest income and a 8.15 percent decline of business expenditure as the result of cut backs.

China's banks lent a record 9.59 trillion yuan (1.4 trillion U.S. dollars) last year, almost double that of the previous year, to support the government's economic stimulus package amid the global downturn.

In January, Liu Mingkang, chairman of the China Banking Regulatory Commission, demanded lenders to keep credit growth at reasonable pace in 2010 and vowed to tighten supervision on property loans, given the increasing risk of asset bubbles.

China's new yuan-denominated lending in January stood at 1.39 trillion yuan, down 14.2 percent from a year earlier, the People's Bank of China, the central bank, said last Month.