Soft Start Anticipated For China Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The China stock market has moved higher in two of three trading days since the end of the three-day losing streak in which it had retreated almost 70 points or 2.3 percent. The Shanghai Composite Index now sits just above the 3,235-point plateau although it's likely to move back to the downside on Friday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is soft, with oil and technology shares expected to lead the markets lower. The European markets were up and the U.S. bourses were down and the Asian markets figure to follow the latter lead.

The SCI finished modestly higher on Thursday following gains from the financial shares and resource companies.

For the day, the index rose 8.92 points or 0.28 percent to finish at 3,236.03 after trading between 3,217.10 and 3,265.28. The Shenzhen Composite Index improved 8.31 points or 0.44 percent to end at 1,909.45.

Among the actives, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China was up 0.75 percent, while China Construction Bank increased 1.68 percent, China Merchants Bank advanced 0.86 percent, Agricultural Bank of China gained 0.59 percent, China Life Insurance collected 0.73 percent, Jiangxi Copper spiked 2.93 percent, Aluminum Corp of China (Chalco) surged 5.00 percent, Yankuang Energy improved 0.75 percent, PetroChina jumped 1.58 percent, China Petroleum and Chemical (Sinopec) added 0.32 percent, Huaneng Power lost 0.47 percent, China Shenhua Energy strengthened 1.25 percent, Gemdale shed 0.44 percent, Poly Developments sank 0.80 percent and China Vanke rose 0.29 percent.

The lead from Wall Street is negative as the major averages opened slightly higher on Thursday but quickly turned lower, spending most of the day in the red before finishing under water.

The Dow sank 68.42 points or 0.16 percent to finish at 43,153.13, while the NASDAQ slumped 172.95 points or 0.89 percent to close at 19,338.29 and the S&P 500 slipped 12.57 points or 0.21 percent to end at 5,937.34.

The choppy trading on Wall Street came as traders took a step back to assess the near-term outlook for the markets following Wednesday's rally, which saw the major averages post their largest daily percentage gains in over two months.

Traders were also digesting a slew of U.S. economic data, including reports on weekly jobless claims, retail sales and import prices.

The data was largely in line with expectations and maintained optimism that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates in the first half of this year.

Oil prices fell sharply on Thursday after Israel and Hamas agreed to implement a ceasefire agreement that was drafted and approved by the UN Security Council. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for February settled lower by $1.36 or 1.7 percent at $78.68 a barrel.

Closer to home, China is scheduled to release a batch of data later this morning, including Q4 numbers for GDP and December figures for industrial production, retail sales, fixed asset investment and unemployment.

GDP is expected to rise 1.7 percent on quarter and 5.0 percent on year after advancing 0.9 percent on quarter and 4.6 percent on year in the third quarter.

Industrial production is called steady at 5.4 percent on year, while retail sales are expected to gain an annual 3.5 percent - up from 3.0 percent in November. FAI (3.3 percent) and the jobless rate (5.0 percent) are expected to be unchanged from the previous month.