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China Shares Edge Up After Last Week’s Roller-Coaster Ride
Japan, Australia near bear-market territory amid ongoing fears about China’s slowing growth and drop in oil prices
By CHAO DENG
Updated Jan. 18, 2016 3:37 a.m. ET
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China shares edged up Monday following a roller-coaster week, reflecting moves by Chinese authorities to stabilize the yuan and bargain hunting by investors.
The Shanghai Composite Index finished up 0.4% at 2913.84, after falling on Friday into bear market territory—defined as a drop of at least 20% from a recent high. The benchmark is down 17.7% this year.
Traders and analysts attributed the gains partly to an announcement Monday that China will require foreign banks engaged in offshore yuan trading to place reserves with the central bank. The step was aimed at speculators, who have been pushing the yuan sharply lower in offshore trading as expectations on China’s economy sour. The offshore Chinese yuan was last up 0.4%, after the central bank guided its onshore counterpart stronger earlier Monday.
Also, local investors were watching closely to see whether the Shanghai benchmark would hold above the key level of 2850.71, the last low it reached on Aug. 26—which it did.
But elsewhere in Asia, most shares slipped, amid worries about slowing growth in the world’s second-largest economy and a further drop in oil prices.
Australia’s S&P ASX 200 was down 0.7% while the Nikkei Stock Average lost 1.1%. Both benchmarks have lost roughly 19% from their recent highs, nearing bear-market territory.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index ended down 1.5% and South Korea’s Kospi was flat.
India, which is expected to grow faster than many Asian countries, has also been caught up in the recent global stock market rout. The country’s benchmark S&P BSE Sensex had lost 6.3% of its value this year through Friday. On Monday, the Sensex was trading slightly lower.
“You have a little bit of a breather” with China recovering, said Tareck Horchani, senior sales trader at Saxo Capital Markets, though he doesn’t believe it is time for investors to get back into most markets in the region. “Overall, the market is very nervous about oil going lower,” he said.
A 2.7% fall in the Brent oil benchmark to $28.18 hurt the region’s energy shares. The sector was down 2.5% in Hong Kong.
The stabilization seen in Chinese markets on Monday may be short lived. Investors expect China to report on Tuesday that the economy grew at around 7% last year—the slowest pace in a quarter-century.
Meanwhile, some analysts say that a fall in the Shanghai benchmark to 2,500 from the current 2913.84 level could trigger widespread margin calls. Margins loans—money borrowed by investors to fund share purchases—fueled a rally in Shanghai early last year. But when the market began to crumble, brokerages began calling investors to pay back loans, making losses snowball.
The Hong Kong dollar sunk to a fresh four-year low of HK$7.801 to one U.S. dollar, even as the city’s de-facto central bank reiterated Monday that it remains committed to keeping the currency pegged to the U.S. dollar. Monday was the local dollar’s third session of losses, as investors worried that the city’s economy could weaken along with that of China.
The Japanese yen weakened on Monday by 0.2%, to ￥117.24 to one U.S. dollar. But the yen remains near its strongest level in almost five months. A stronger yen hurts Japanese exporters because their goods become more expensive to overseas buyers.
Gold prices were last up 0.1% at $1092 per troy ounce.
—Dominique Fong, Shen Hong and Yifan Xie contributed to this article.
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