China Stock Market Tipped To Extend Losing Streak

(RTTNews) - The China stock market has closed lower in three straight trading days, slipping almost 35 points or 1.2 percent along the way. The Shanghai Composite Index now sits just beneath the 3,090-point plateau and it's likely to see continued consolidation on Monday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is soft on continuing recession fears. The European and U.S. markets were sharply lower on Friday and now the Asian markets are tipped to open in similar fashion.

The SCI finished modestly lower on Friday following losses from the resource and energy companies, while the financials were up and the properties were mixed.

For the day, the index shed 20.54 points or 0.66 percent to finish at 3,088.37 after trading between 3,072.24 and 3,124.66. The Shenzhen Composite Index declined 28.16 points or 1.41 percent to end at 1,963.69.

Among the actives, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China rose 0.23 percent, while Bank of China advanced 0.98 percent, China Construction Bank climbed 0.90 percent, China Merchants Bank collected 0.56 percent, China Life Insurance soared 3.24 percent, Jiangxi Copper skidded 1.10 percent, Aluminum Corp of China (Chalco) retreated 1.57 percent, Yankuang Energy plunged 4.11 percent, PetroChina spiked 1.87 percent, China Petroleum and Chemical (Sinopec) jumped 1.82 percent, Huaneng Power declined 1.59 percent, China Shenhua Energy tanked 2.53 percent, Gemdale slumped 1.25 percent, Poly Developments perked 0.17 percent, China Vanke was up 0.11 percent, China Fortune Land stumbled 1.12 percent, Beijing Capital Development eased 0.22 percent and Bank of Communications was unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street continues to be negative as the major averages opened sharply lower on Friday and stayed that way throughout the session.

The Dow plunged 486.29 points or 1.62 percent to finish at 29,590.41, while the NASDAQ tumbled 198.87 points or 1.80 percent to close at 10.867.93 and the S&P 500 sank 64.76 points or 1.72 percent to end at 3,693.23. For the week, the Dow dropped 4.0 percent, the NASDAQ plunged 5.1 percent and the S&P fell 4.7 percent.

Concerns about the outlook for the global economy continued to weigh on Wall Street after aggressive interest rate hikes by central banks around the world. Traders remain concerned the central banks' efforts to combat elevated inflation will push the global economy into a recession.

The Federal Reserve raised interest rates by another 75 basis points earlier this week and signaled more significant rate hikes later this year.

While the Fed's projections pointed to an eventually tapering of rate hikes by next year, traders worry about the outlook for the global economy in the months ahead.

Crude oil prices fell sharply on Friday, pushing the most active crude futures contract to their lowest close in about seven months. Weak outlook for energy demand due to a possible global recession outweighed concerns about tight supplies. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for November ended lower by $4.75 or 5.7 percent at $78.74 a barrel, the lowest settlement since January.