Benchmark indexes see strong gains

The A-share market showed bullish signs on Thursday, as the benchmark indexes reported strong gains after two months of flat performance, experts said.

The Shanghai Composite Index stood above 3000 points during the morning trading hours on Thursday, which was the first time in two months. The increase slightly contracted in the afternoon so that the index closed at 2985.86 points, up 0.96 percent. The Shenzhen Component Index climbed 0.86 percent to close at 9783.50 points. The ChiNext Index in Shenzhen reported a daily gain of 1.18 percent to close at 1689.05 points.

The total trading volume at the Shanghai and Shenzhen trading houses topped 797.5 billion yuan ($111.7 billion) on Thursday, which was the greatest amount in four months.

Ding Luming, chief economist for financial project and asset allocation department at CITIC Securities, said that the Chinese economy is set to rebound cyclically, which means that the A-share market will see a new round of recovery. The ChiNext Index will hit a record high within the year, which will contribute to sustained bullish performance.

According to Shanghai-based market tracker Wind Info, the A-share listed financial companies reported the strongest daily increase of 4.45 percent on average. Yang Delong, chief economist at Shenzhen-based First Seafront Fund, said that the listed financial service providers, led by securities firms, have shown a strong rebound, which has in turn boosted the performance of the A-share market.

"The public securities firms can be considered an indicator of the A-share market. Their strong performance shows that market confidence has picked up significantly," he said.

The A-share market saw a total capital inflow of 5.71 billion yuan on Thursday via the Shanghai-Hong Kong stock connect program. The capital inflow via the Shenzhen-Hong Kong stock connect mechanism was 3.97 billion yuan.

Jim McCafferty, joint-head of APAC equity research at Nomura, said that the recent first-half results season across the Asia-Pacific region has demonstrated the resilience of the listed Chinese corporate sector. Double-digit earnings growth is still tenable for 2019 which means this market is deserving of a scarcity premium, he said.

Li Lifeng, chief strategist of Sinolink Securities, said that outlook for A-share performance in September is relatively optimistic after the market reached its bottom in the previous month.