China to open up financial sector
BEIJING: China will continue to open up its financial sector and improve rules for foreign banks and insurance firms entering the market, state media quoted the cabinet as saying on Wednesday.
China has stepped up efforts to open its financial sector to help lure in more foreign investment and shoreuptheeconomy,amidritswiththeunitedstates.
China will improve market access requirements for foreign banks and insurance companies, state media quoted the cabinet as saying.
The country will also improve rules on crossborderexchangesbetweenparentsandsubsidiaries of financial institutions, the cabinet said without elaborating.
Chinawillimproveitsmacro-prudentialframework to monitor systemic finiancial risks, the cabinet said, adding that China will keep the yuan exchange rate basically stable.
It will maintain steady growth in imports and exports in the second half, the cabinet added.
Meanwhile the China stocks rose on Wednesday, with Shenzhen’s tech-heavy Chinext index hiting a six-year high, and as shares of natural resources companies jumped.
The blue-chip CSI300 index rose 0.7 per cent to 5,144.04 points, while the Shanghai Composite Index gained 0.7 per cent to 3,562.66 points.
Shenzhen’s Chinext jumped nearly 3 per cent to its highest level since June 2015. Shanghai’s techfocused STAR market gained 2.8 per cent. Foreign investors have been buying mainland Chinese stocks via Stock Connect for three straight days despite recent volatility, as China’s low correlations with the US Federal Reserve’s policy offer diversification benefits to global porfolio managers, Mizuho Bank said in a note.
Blackrock, which this year started treating China as a standalone asset class separate from emerging and developed markets, said in a weekly note that following China’s cut in banks’ required reserves, “we see potential for more, broad-based loosening in the near term, including in fiscal and other policies”.