Higher Open Predicted For China Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The China stock market on Friday ended the two-day slide in which it had slipped almost 15 points or 0.5 percent. The Shanghai Composite Index now sits just above the 3,275-point plateau and it's expected to see additional support on Monday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is upbeat on easing inflation concerns and an improved outlook for interest rates. The European and U.S. markets were up and the Asian bourses figure to follow that lead.

The SCI finished sharply higher on Friday with gains across the board, especially among the financials, properties and resource stocks.

For the day, the index spiked 59.26 points or 1.84 percent to finish at 3,275.93 after trading between 3,200.99 and 3,280.28. The Shenzhen Composite Index climbed 24.89 points or 1.23 percent to end at 2,052.62.

Among the actives, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China jumped 1.91 percent, while Bank of China rallied2.36 percent, China Construction Bank collected 1.65 percent, China Merchants Bank spiked 4.28 percent, Bank of Communications strengthened 1.76 percent, China Life Insurance surged 5.74 percent, Jiangxi Copper climbed 1.18 percent, Aluminum Corp of China (Chalco) improved 1.64 percent, Yankuang Energy added 0.62 percent, PetroChina gathered 1.27 percent, China Petroleum and Chemical (Sinopec) rose 0.48 percent, Huaneng Power increased 071 percent, China Shenhua Energy was up 0.11 percent, Gemdale skyrocketed 9.30 percent, Poly Developments soared 4.96 percent, China Vanke accelerated 3.39 percent, China Fortune Land advanced 0.80 percent and Beijing Capital Development rallied 3.22 percent.

The lead from Wall Street is solid as the major averages opened higher on Friday and remained in the green throughout the trading day.

The Dow jumped 176.59 points or 0.50 percent to finish at 35,459.29, while the NASDAQ surged 266.56 points or 1.90 percent to end at 14,316.66 and the S&P 500 advanced 44.82 points or 0.99 percent to close at 4,582.23.

The strength on Wall Street was the result of encouraging earnings updates from top tech firms and data showing a slowdown in the annual rate of growth in consumer prices in June.

Easing worries about interest rates following the Federal Reserve hinting at a pause in hikes as early as September helped as well.

The slowdown in the annual rate of consumer price growth may ease concerns about the outlook for interest rates following Thursday's better-than-expected economic data.

Oil prices climbed higher on Friday, and the most active futures contract posted gains for the fifth straight week amid easing U.S. recession fears and on optimism over increased demand. West Texas Intermediate Crude futures for September added $0.49 or 0.6 percent at $80.58 a barrel. WTI crude futures gained 4.6 percent in the week.

Closer to home, China will release July results for its manufacturing, non-manufacturing and composite PMIs from the National Bureau of Statistics later this morning; in June, their scores were 49.0, 53.2 and 52.5, respectively.