SHANGHAI, Jan 26 (Reuters) - China's yuan climbed to a new 32-month high against the dollar on Monday as the central bank continued its recent practice of carefully guiding the currency stronger by lifting the official midpoint guidance to manage the pace of appreciation.

Despite the firm fixings, the central bank has been setting the midpoint weaker than market projections since November. And Monday's fixing marked the largest weak-side deviation from market forecasts since such data first became available in 2022.

Before the market opened, the People's Bank of China set the midpoint at 6.9843 per dollar, the strongest since May 17, 2023, though it was 551 pips weaker than a Reuters estimate of 6.9292.

"We expect growing resistance from China's authorities to yuan appreciation pressures," Barclays analysts said in a note.

"We also expect more measures to ease upward pressure on the yuan in the weeks and months ahead and maintain our view of a turnaround over the medium term."

In the spot market, the onshore yuan rose to a high of 6.9539 per dollar, the strongest level since May 16, 2023, before changing hands at 6.9558 at 0350 GMT.

Its offshore counterpart last fetched 6.9522 per dollar at 0350 GMT.

The yuan has gained 0.5% against the dollar so far this year following a 4.5% rise in 2025, which was the most substantial annual appreciation since 2020. Its recent strength has been supported by a weaker dollar and increased corporate demand for the Chinese currency as the Lunar New Year holiday approaches.

Exporters usually settle more foreign exchange receipts around this time to cover various payments including employee bonuses before the Lunar New Year holiday, which falls in mid-February this year.

Forex conversions will likely begin to fade this week, providing less support for the yuan, currency traders and analysts said.

In global markets, several Asian currencies strengthened after the Japanese yen jumped to a more than two-month high on growing speculation that coordinated intervention by authorities in the U.S. and Japan could be imminent, a prospect Tokyo's top currency diplomat left wide open, keeping markets guessing.

LEVELS AT 0350 GMT:

INSTRUMENT CURRENT UP/DOWN % DAY'S DAY'S

vs USD (-) VS. CHANGE HIGH LOW

PREVIOU YR-TO-D

S CLOSE ATE

%

Spot yuan 6.9558 0.1 0.5 6.9539 6.9588

Offshore 6.9522 0.04 0.3 6.9418 6.9548

yuan spot

(Reporting by Shanghai Newsroom; Editing by Thomas Derpinghaus)