NEW YORK (Bloomberg) — China's economy, the world's third biggest, may expand at a faster pace in 2010 even as officials cool lending to restrain inflation and avert asset bubbles.

Goldman Sachs Group Inc. maintained its forecast for 11.4 percent growth after the central bank raised reserve requirements for lenders on Friday. That compares with an 8.7 percent expansion last year.

Declines in stocks and commodities because of the reserve-ratio announcement highlighted concern that monetary tightening in China may trigger a slowdown that undermines the global recovery. Rebounding exports, up for a second month in January, may boost a Chinese economy that last year depended on its own stimulus-fuelled investment and consumption for growth.

"The Chinese economy is in good shape and exports will be the biggest swing factor this year," said Lu Ting, a Hong Kong-based economist for Bank of America-Merrill Lynch. "Outside China, people underestimate the government's ability to manage the economy and the stimulus exit."

Merrill forecasts 10.1 percent growth and Capital Economics Ltd. sees a 10 percent gain, estimates unchanged from before the reserve-ratio announcement that takes effect Feb. 25.

The Chinese central bank moved after banks extended 19 percent of this year's 7.5 trillion yuan ($1.1 trillion) target for lending in January and property prices climbed the most in 21 months. Since October, policy makers have said managing inflation expectations is one of the government's key objectives. Consumer prices rose 1.5 percent in January from a year earlier, the third straight advance.

Foreign companies are relying on growth in emerging economies such as China to prop up earnings as unemployment restrains US demand and the Greek debt crisis highlights weakness in Europe. London-based Rio Tinto Group, the world's second-biggest iron-ore producer, said last week that China became its largest single market in 2009.

The Asian nation supplanted Germany as the world's biggest exporter last year and is poised to replace Japan as the No. 2 economy behind the US in 2010.

"The Chinese authorities are clearly trying to bring excessive bank lending under control," Stephen Roach, the chairman of Morgan Stanley Asia Ltd., said in an interview in Mumbai on February 12. The rest of the world should "take a lesson from what China is doing in moving much more aggressively to adapt to the post-crisis exit strategy."

The central bank on January 12 increased reserve requirements for the first time since June 2008. The latest move was triggered by the need to soak up money from maturing central-bank bills and cash added to the financial system for this week's Lunar New Year holiday, according to China International Capital Corp., the top brokerage for China research based on a 2009 survey by Asiamoney magazine.