BEIJING, Dec. 17 -- An increasing portion of Chinese residents are unhappy about the country's price levels, with nearly half of them saying overall prices are "too high and unacceptable", according to a quarterly survey by the People's Bank of China.

The portion of residents giving that response in the fourth-quarter survey, 46.8 percent, was up from 45.2 percent last quarter, the central bank said on its website on Wednesday.

Only 28.2 percent of surveyed residents said they were content with current price levels, according to the survey, which covered urban residents in 50 cities. That was down from 29.5 percent three months earlier.

China's consumer prices rose 0.6 percent in November over a year earlier after nine straight months of declines. The survey also showed that inflationary expectations are building among residents.

In another survey of bankers, 66 percent of them said they expected monetary policy to remain the same in the first quarter of 2010.

The survey also showed that demand for loans was falling, with that sub-index declining to 67 percent from 68 percent in the third quarter.