China set its daily reference rate for the yuan at a level that was significantly weaker than estimated by traders and analysts, suggesting the central bank is aiming to ease gains in the managed currency.

The People’s Bank of China set the so-called fixing at 7.0733 per dollar, 164 pips lower than the average estimate in a Bloomberg survey. The gap between the fixing, which limits the onshore yuan’s moves by 2% on either side, and a forecast on the weak side was the largest since February 2022.

The yuan fell 0.1% in both onshore and overseas trading Thursday morning, after rising to the highest versus the dollar in more than a year this week. Versus a basket of currencies, it has been trading near the strongest since April.

China’s central bank is trying to engineer a calibrated ascent

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