China stocks rise; vaccine scandal caps gains
* Shanghai stocks higher, blue-chip CSI300 index up
* Guizhou Changzheng Tiancheng Holding leads
* China’s A-shares at 20.64 pct premium over H-shares
SHANGHAI, July 23 (Reuters) – China stocks rose on Monday, aided by strength in financials and industrial stocks, but a slump in healthcare shares amid a vaccine scandal capped broader gains.
** The blue-chip CSI300 index rose 0.9 percent to 3,525.75 points while the Shanghai Composite Index ended up 1.1 percent at 2,859.54 points.
** An index tracking major healthcare firms on the mainland slumped 4.1 percent, led by a 10 percent drop in Chongqing Zhifei Biological Products, hit by a selloff after a major vaccine maker last week was found to have violated standards in making rabies vaccine for humans.
** Chinese Premier Li Keqiang has called for an immediate investigation into the scandal over faulty vaccines that he said had crossed a moral line, and urged severe punishment for the companies and people implicated.
** Meanwhile, investors bought financial and industry stocks, after China released draft rules and guidelines to strengthen regulations of financial institutions’ wealth management and asset management businesses.
** Earlier on Friday, the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission (CBIRC) released long-awaited draft rules on commercial banks’ wealth management products (WMPs), saying that these WMPs should be managed based on their net value.
** “The biggest concern among market participants for Beijing’s deleveraging campaign is a one-size-fits-all approach which could cut off liquidity,” said Yang Hai, strategist at Kaiyuan Securities.
** The new draft rules eased the concern and will bode well for banking firms, Yang added.
** Around the region, MSCI’s Asia ex-Japan stock index was weaker by 0.11 percent while Japan’s Nikkei index closed down 1.33 percent.
** At 07:07 GMT, the yuan was quoted at 6.775 per U.S. dollar, 0.17 percent firmer than the previous close of 6.7864.
** The largest percentage gainers in the main Shanghai Composite index were Guizhou Changzheng Tiancheng Holding Co Ltd , up 10.13 percent, followed by Long Yuan Construction Group Co Ltd, up 10.06 percent and Bank of Chengdu Co Ltd, up 10.05 percent.
** The largest percentage losers in the Shanghai index were Shanghai Hile Bio-Technology Co Ltd and Henan Oriental Silver Star Investment Co Ltd, down 10.01 percent each, followed by Nanjing King-friend Biochemical Pharmaceutical Co Ltd, down by 9.99 percent.
** So far this year, the Shanghai stock index is down 13.5 percent, the CSI300 has fallen 12.5 percent while China’s H-share index listed in Hong Kong is down 8.1 percent. Shanghai stocks have risen 0.42 percent this month.
** About 17.34 billion shares were traded on the Shanghai exchange, roughly 133.2 percent of the market’s 30-day moving average of 13.02 billion shares a day. The volume in the previous trading session was 14.59 billion.
** As of 07:08 GMT, China’s A-shares were trading at a premium of 20.64 percent over the Hong Kong-listed H-shares.
** The Shanghai stock index is below its 50-day moving average and below its 200-day moving average. (Reporting by Shanghai Newsroom; Editing by Vyas Mohan)
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