Banking gains drag stocks to 2-year high

Chinese stocks climbed on Thursday to end at two-year highs, underpinned by robust gains in banking and infrastructure firms.

At the close, the Shanghai Composite Index was up 0.87 percent at 3,474.75.

The blue-chip CSI300 index was up 0.55 percent, with its financial sector sub-index higher by 0.94 percent, the consumer staples sector up 0.14 percent, the real estate index down 1.1 percent and the healthcare sub-index down 0.62 percent.

Meanwhile, the smaller Shenzhen index ended up 0.14 percent while the start-up board ChiNext index weakened by 0.23 percent.

The largest percentage gainers in the main Shanghai Composite Index were Guizhou Wire Rope Co up 10.04 percent, followed by Qinghai Spring Medicinal Resources Technology Co gaining 10.04 percent and Xinjiang Korla Pear Co up by 10 percent.

So far this year, the Shanghai stock index is up 4.16 percent, the CSI300 has gained 6 percent, while China’s H-share index listed in Hong Kong is up 9.9 percent. Shanghai stocks have risen by 4.16 percent so far this month.

About 22 billion shares were traded on the Shanghai exchange, roughly 132.8 percent of the market’s 30-day moving average of 16.57 billion shares a day. The volume in the previous trading session was 26.10 billion.

The price-to-earnings ratio of the Shanghai index was 15.59 as of the last full trading day while the dividend yield was 1.9 percent.

So far this week, the market capitalization of the Shanghai stock index has risen by 0.40 percent to 30.23 trillion yuan ($4.69 trillion).