DALIAN (China) - BANK of China, the country's biggest foreign exchange lender, will need more capital to maintain its capital adequacy ratios, but it has no specific fund-raising plans, an executive said on Thursday.

The company saw its net interest margins bottom out in July, executive vice president Zhou Min told Reuters in an interview at the World Economic Forum in the northeastern Chinese port city of Dalian.

His remarks echoed recent comments made by rivals including ICBC and China Construction Bank, which said their net interest margins were beginning to recover.

Mr Zhou added that despite a boom in lending in the first half of the year, Bank of China does not expect to see any major rise in its non-performing loan ratio in the near future, and that overall lending patterns for China's banking industry should grow in a stable pattern over the next six to 12 months. -- REUTERS