China Stock Market May Find Traction On Monday

(RTTNews) - The China stock market has moved lower in two straight sessions, sinking more than 30 points or 1 percent along the way. The Shanghai Composite Index now sits just shy of the 3,170-point plateau although it's looking at a steady start on Monday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is mixed and flat ahead of this week's rate decision from the FOMC. The European and U.S. markets were mixed and little changed and the Asian bourses figure to follow that lead.

The SCI finished barely lower on Friday as losses from the insurance and energy stocks were mitigated by support from the banks and properties.

For the day, the index dipped 1.77 points or 0.06 percent to finish at 3,167.75 after trading between 3,157.33 and 3,185.64. The Shenzhen Composite Index slipped 3.82 points or 0.19 percent to end at 2,011.83.

Among the actives, Bank of China rose 0.27 percent, while China Construction Bank eased 0.17 percent, China Merchants Bank collected 0.35 percent, Bank of Communications dipped 0.18 percent, China Life Insurance skidded 1.03 percent, Jiangxi Copper added 0.37 percent, Yankuang Energy tumbled 1.76 percent, PetroChina slipped 0.12 percent, China Petroleum and Chemical (Sinopec) was down 0.16 percent, Huaneng Power gained 0.55 percent, China Shenhua Energy fell 0.32 percent, Gemdale climbed 1.01 percent, Poly Developments advanced 0.94 percent, China Vanke improved 0.72 percent, China Fortune Land surged 5.78 percent and Industrial and Commercial Bank of China and Aluminum Corp of China (Chalco) were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street offers little guidance as the major averages opened higher on Friday but faded as the day progressed, ending mixed and little changed.

The Dow added 2.49 points or 0.01 percent to finish at 35,227.69, while the NASDAQ lost 30.49 points or 0.22 percent to close at 14,032.81 and the S&P 500 rose 1.47 points or 0.03 percent to end at 4,536.34.

With the uptick, the Dow closed higher for the 10th straight session and surged 2.1 percent for the week. The S&P 500 also climbed 0.7 percent for the week, while the NASDAQ fell 0.6 percent.

The choppy trading on Wall Street came as traders seemed reluctant to make significant moves ahead of the Federal Reserve's highly anticipated monetary policy meeting this week.

With the Fed widely expected to raise interest rates by another 25 basis point, traders are likely to pay close attention to the accompanying statement for clues about the outlook for rates.

Oil futures settled higher on Friday, lifted by data showing a drop in U.S. crude inventories and recent announcements by Saudi Arabia and Russia about crude output reductions. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for September rose $1.42 or 1.9 percent at 77.07 a barrel. WTI Crude futures gained 2.3 percent in the week.