TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Chinese shares rise as infrastructure hopes sway investor focus from Taiwan
Change Size
Pedestrians wait to cross a road at a junction near a giant display of stock indexes in Shanghai, China, on Aug. 3, 2022.
(Reuters/Aly Song)
C
hina and Hong Kong stocks rose on Thursday, as investors' focus shifted from tensions around Taiwan to a raft of newly launched infrastructure projects that Beijing hopes can help stabilize its COVID-19-hit economy.
China's blue-chip CSI300 Index climbed 0.3 percent by the lunch break, while the Shanghai Composite Index gained 0.2 percent.
Hong Kong's benchmark index Hang Seng added 1.5 percent, led by technology shares.
Analysts said markets were relieved that US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi's visit to Taiwan did not trigger direct military conflict, although Sino-US tensions linger over the self-ruled island that China claimed its own.
"This episode is just going to be one of many episodes that are going to happen in the next 10 years, where every now and then there's going to be tensions between the two superpowers," said Nuno Fernandes, partner and portfolio manager of GW&K. "We do think that cooler heads prevail."
Investors' focus now shifted to signs infrastructure investment is gathering pace as Beijing seeks to revive its economy.
In July, 3,876 major projects started construction, involving total investment of 2.4 trillion yuan ($355.33 billion), the Securities Times said on Thursday.
In the second half, China's State Grid plans to invest more than 150 billion yuan in ultra-high voltage (UHV) power transmission lines, state media Xinhua News reported.
China's infrastructure stocks rose 0.7 percent. China's banking stocks also gained ahead of the release of July lending data.
In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng Tech Index jumped 2.2 percent.
Hong Kong-listed shares of Alibaba jumped 4 percent as the Chinese tech giant will report its earnings on Thursday.
Trip.com, Baidu and SMIC all rose more than 3 percent in Hong Kong.
