Ahead of the long break for Labor Day, the China stock market had finished higher in three straight sessions, gathering almost 160 points or 5.4 percent along the way. The Shanghai Composite Index now rests just beneath the 3,050-point plateau although it’s likely to open lower on Thursday as it catches up on missed sentiment.
The global forecast for the Asian markets is upbeat on optimism regarding the outlook for interest rates. The European markets were down and the U.S. bourses were up and the Asian markets figure to follow the latter lead.
The SCI finished with huge gains on Friday, led by the financial shares, properties and resource stocks.
For the day, the index surged 71.58 points or 2.41 percent to finish at 3,047.06 after trading between 2,968.33 and 3,048.49. The Shenzhen Composite Index soared 70.41 points or 3.89 percent to end at 1,878.88.
Among the actives, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China rose 0.21 percent, while Bank of China dropped 0.92 percent, China Construction Bank collected 0.33 percent, China Merchants Bank gained 0.78 percent, China Life Insurance spiked 3.88 percent, Jiangxi Copper accelerated 3.46 percent, Aluminum Corp of China (Chalco) rallied 2.37 percent, Yankuang Energy jumped 1.82 percent, PetroChina soared 3.86 percent, China Petroleum and Chemical (Sinopec) added 0.46 percent, Huaneng Power dipped 0.27 percent, China Shenhua Energy retreated 1.38 percent, Gemdale strengthened 3.33 percent, Poly Developments climbed 1.80 percent, China Vanke surged 3.64 percent, Beijing Capital Development skyrocketed 4.04 percent and Bank of Communications was unchanged.
The lead from Wall Street is broadly positive as the major averages hugged the unchanged line for most of the day before skyrocketing in the final hour.
The Dow surged 932.27 points or 2.81 percent to finish at 34,061.06, while the NASDAQ soared 401.10 points or 3.19 percent to end at 12,964.86 and the S&P 500 jumped 124.69 points or 2.99 percent to close at 4,300.17.
The late-day rally on Wall Street came after Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell indicated the central bank does not plan to raise interest rates as aggressively as some had feared.
The comments from Powell came after the Fed announced its widely expected decision to raise interest rates by half a percentage point in an effort to return elevated inflation to its 2 percent objective – even though overall U.S. economy activity edged down in the first quarter.
In economic news, the Institute for Supply Management showed an unexpected slowdown in the pace of growth in U.S. service sector activity in April. Also, payroll processor ADP showed U.S. private sector job growth slowed more than expected last month.
Crude oil prices rose sharply Wednesday, lifted by the European Union’s decision to impose sanctions on Russian oil. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for June climbed $5.58 or 5.5 percent to $107.79 a barrel.
Closer to home, China will see April results for its services and composite PMIs from the National Bureau of Statistics later this morning; in March, their scores were 42.0 and 43.9, respectively.
Market Analysis
Profit Taking Expected For China Stock Market
2022-05-05 00:30:26
