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Shares end higher on fresh policy hopes

(China Daily)
Updated: 2008-12-09 08:11

Shanghai stock market surged to a two-month closing high in heavy trade yesterday, led by property and financial shares on hopes that a meeting of top economic planners this week would produce more government action to aid the sector and the overall economy.

The Shanghai Composite Index ended up 3.57 percent at 2090.773 points, less than a point off the day's high, after rising 7.88 percent last week.

More than 60 Shanghai A shares jumped their 10 percent daily limits.

Turnover in Shanghai A shares rose to 116.2 billion yuan from Friday's 85.9 billion yuan.

The index's rise yesterday broke chart resistance at its mid-November peak of 2050 points, which could point the market up in coming weeks as far as its late September peak of 2333 points, some analysts believe.

"This is the third day in a row that the index has stood above its 60-day moving average (now at 1963), which is quite positive technically," noted Cao Xuefeng, analyst at Western Securities.

"That suggests the index may test the 2100-2200 point area early this week, though it could then face profit-taking because economic data for November is expected to be very poor."

Financial shares were strong with Merchants Bank up 8.27 percent to 14.12 yuan. The China Securities Journal reported on Friday that China might cut effective corporate tax rates for banks.

Citigroup estimated that a 2 percentage point reduction in the tax would increase next year's earnings in the sector by 6 percent, while an accompanying change in the tax basis could raise that to 9 to 10 percent.

But it added that such a gain would be cancelled out by falling net interest margins for banks as China eased monetary policy, and by higher credit costs.

HSI 8.7% higher

Hong Kong shares soared 8.7 percent to a seven-week high yesterday, boosted by talk of further measures from the central government to support banks and markets as well as push up private consumption.

A strong surge in mainboard turnover to HK$64 billion compared with just HK$37.3 billion on Friday. The benchmark Hang Seng Index finished 1198.78 points higher at 15044.87.

The China Enterprises Index of top locally listed mainland firms had risen 9.5 percent to 8137.45 on hopes of more government action to aid the markets.

Agencies