SHANGHAI/SINGAPORE, Sept 21 (Reuters) - China's central bank set the yuan's daily midpoint fixing at the highest level in over a month on Thursday, while its value against a basket of currencies recovered.

The People's Bank of China (PBOC) set the midpoint rate , around which the yuan is allowed to trade in a 2% band, at 7.1730 per dollar prior to the market open, 2 pips firmer than the previous fix of 7.1732. Thursday's official guidance was the strongest since Aug. 14.

The firmer midpoint drove the yuan's value against its major trading partners to 98.78, the highest level since May 29. It has now recouped all of its losses made earlier this year and is up 0.11% year-to-date.

Meanwhile, the spot yuan was down more than 5% to the dollar during the same period.

(Reporting by Winni Zhou and Tom Westbrook; Editing by Kim Coghill)