Additional Support Expected For China Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The China stock market has moved higher in three straight sessions, improving almost 90 points or 2.8 percent along the way. The Shanghai Composite Index now rests just above the 3,320-point plateau and it may add to its winnings again on Tuesday. The global forecast for the Asian markets is upbeat, supported by the oil, finance and technology sectors. The European and U.S. markets saw modest upside and the Asian bourses are expected to follow suit. The SCI finished modestly higher again on Monday as gains from the properties and resource stocks were offset by weakness from the financial shares. For the day, the index added 18.50 points or 0.56 percent to finish at 3,322.17 after trading between 3,299.24 and 3,325.36. The Shenzhen Composite Index climbed 21.57 points or 1.08 percent to end at 2,017.81. Among the actives, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China fell 0.30 percent, while Bank of China dipped 0.19 percent, China Merchants Bank collected 1.00 percent, China Life Insurance shed 0.54 percent, Jiangxi Copper added 0.42 percent, Aluminum Corp of China (Chalco) improved 0.77 percent, Yankuang Energy lost 0.67 percent, PetroChina slipped 0.36 percent, China Shenhua Energy and Huaneng Power both sank 0.77 percent, Gemdale gained 0.42 percent, Poly Developments perked 0.24 percent and China Vanke, China Construction Bank, Agricultural Bank of China and China Petroleum and Chemical (Sinopec) were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is positive as the major averages opened higher on Monday and remained in the green throughout the trading day.

The Dow climbed 167.01 points or 0.38 percent to finish at 44,470.41, while the NASDAQ rallied 190.87 points or 0.98 percent to close at 19,714.27 and the S&P 500 gained 40.45 points or 0.67 percent to end at 6,066.44.

The rebound on Wall Street reflected bargain hunting, as traders picked up stocks at somewhat reduced levels following Friday's sharp pullback.

While Friday's slump partly reflected new tariff threats from President Donald Trump, traders largely shrugged off his latest threat to impose a 25 percent tariff on all steel and aluminum imports into the U.S.

Amid a light day on the U.S. economic front, traders were also looking ahead to the release of several key events in the coming days, especially consumer and producer inflation reports and congressional testimony by Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell.

Oil prices climbed higher on Monday amid concerns about possible supply shortage due to the latest sanctions by U.S. on Iran's crude exports. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for March settled higher by $1.32 or about 1.85% at $72.32 a barrel.