China Bourse May Add To Its Winnings On Thursday

(RTTNews) - The China stock market has moved higher in three straight sessions, improving almost 65 points or 1.9 percent along the way. The Shanghai Composite Index now rests just above the 3,400-point plateau and it's looking at a higher open again on Thursday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is murky as uncertainty about U.S. trade policies continues to weigh. The European markets were down and the U.S. bourses were mostly higher and the Asian markets figure to split the difference.

The SCI finished modestly higher on Wednesday following gains from the financial shares, property stocks and resource companies.

For the day, the index advanced 29.08 points or 0.86 percent to finish at 3,403.95 after trading between 3,368.08 and 3,417.31. The Shenzhen Composite Index added 10.35 points or 0.52 percent to end at 2,010.58.

Among the actives, Bank of China and Agricultural Bank of China both perked 0.18 percent, while China Merchants Bank improved 0.56 percent, Bank of Communications collected 0.65 percent, China Life Insurance surged 5.32 percent, Jiangxi Copper climbed 1.33 percent, Aluminum Corp of China (Chalco) accelerated 2.73 percent, Yankuang Energy spiked 2.61 percent, PetroChina strengthened 1.59 percent, China Petroleum and Chemical (Sinopec) jumped 1.75 percent, Huaneng Power shed 0.40 percent, China Shenhua Energy rose 0.59 percent, Gemdale increased 0.48 percent, Poly Developments gained 0.60 percent, China Vanke added 0.44 percent and Industrial and Commercial Bank of China was unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is mixed to higher as the major averages opened in the green but spent most of the day bouncing back and forth across the unchanged line before finally ending mixed.

The Dow slumped 89.37 points or 0.21 percent to finish at 42,051.06, while the NASDAQ rallied 136.72 points or 0.72 percent to close at 19,146.81 and the S&P 500 rose 6.03 points or 0.10 percent to end at 5,892.58.

The choppy trading on Wall Street came as traders took a step back to assess the recent rally by the markets, which has seen the S&P 500 rebound strongly from its early April lows to turn positive for 2025.

While trade deals between the U.S. and China and the U.K. have helped ease concerns about President Donald Trump's trade policies, uncertainty about the eventual outcome continues to hang over the markets.

Traders also were reluctant to make more significant moves ahead of the release of a slew of U.S. economic data on Thursday, including producer prices, retail sales and industrial production. A speech by Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell is also likely to attract attention.

Crude oil prices slipped again on Wednesday, after data showed that U.S. crude inventories unexpectedly jumped last week. West Texas Intermediate crude for June delivery shed 0.80 or 1.27 percent to 62.87 per barrel.