As part of an effort to make interest rates more market-driven and to encourage lending to businesses to support the economy, the central bank in June allowed commercial banks to cap their rates at 10 percent higher than the benchmark deposit rate and set a floor 30 percent lower than the benchmark lending rate in July.

The greater flexibility will depress Chinese commercial banks' net interest margin by 4 to 6 basis points in 2012 and reduce their net profits by about 28.5 billion yuan or 3 percent of the sector's net profit for 2011, according to Moody's.

The negative impact on NIM could be as much as 10 to 13 basis points and could reduce net profit by 79.6 billion yuan for 2013, the credit rating agency estimated.

The drive to maintain profitability in view of the likely compression in NIM could push the banks to increase lending to higher-risk borrowers, according to the Moody's report.

But as the slowdown in the economy is bottoming out and the export situation is improving, "asset quality issues are not as severe as (previously) expected," Hu said.

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