Global standing of China's equity market to rise

The capitalization of China's stock market will account for 20 percent of the global total by 2030, supported by the privatization of State-owned enterprises, British bank Standard Chartered Plc has forecast.

That share will put China just behind the United States, which is forecast to account for 21 percent of the world's total equity market value.

The bank noted in a report published on Wednesday that China accounted for just 6 percent of the global equity market in 2012. Last year, the world's total market capitalization was equivalent to $52.4 trillion.

By 2030, India's share of the global total will be 6 percent, Japan's 5 percent and the total for the eurozone will be 11 percent.

Standard Chartered said that the continuing expansion of market capitalization in China will be driven by companies' need for capital to fund growth. As economies develop, companies become larger, more capital-intensive and more global, it said.

They develop a preference for public market ownership. Leverage also rises, generating a need for bank capital that is often met through public equity.

Another driver, said the bank, will be the privatization of China's State-owned enterprises through initial public offerings.

While this process is already underway across much of the developing world, state-owned enterprises in many countries, including China, remain government-controlled and have small public floats.

The process of true privatization will require many more years of secondary offerings, the bank said.

As of Oct 31, China's State-owned enterprises had 90 trillion yuan ($14.7 trillion) in total assets.

As of the end of 2012, the aggregate market capitalization of all 953 SOEs that had floated shares was 13.7 trillion yuan, accounting for 51.4 percent of the total market capitalization of the A-share market.

SOEs must raise their dividend payout rate to 30 percent by 2020, compared with zero to 15 percent now.

That requirement is expected to put pressure on SOEs' capital positions and push them into the equity market to raise funds.