Center
Official says right time for stock-index futures
(Shanghai Daily)
Updated: 2006-09-03 11:10
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"We are proceeding smoothly to form the financial derivative exchange," said Jiang Yang, assistant to the chairman of the China Securities Regulatory Commission, at an economic forum in Shanghai. "We have the basic conditions to launch stock-index futures and other financial derivatives."
After launching the stock-index futures, the commission plans to "follow with a slew of other financial futures and options," Jiang added.
Although he didn't specify a time-frame, people familiar with the situation told Shanghai Daily yesterday that authorities may unveil rules on equity-index futures in November and launch related products as early as in December.
China is on track to build a financial-derivative center in Shanghai as part of the central government's efforts to bolster the nation's capital markets and allow companies more tools to hedge against risks.
The country's bourses also are striving to compete with overseas counterparts in product innovations and enhanced market fundamentals to gain an edge before China further deregulates the financial industry to foreign competitors.
The Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges last month sued equity-index provider FTSE/Xinhua Index for authorizing Singapore Exchange to unveil the first China stock futures contract next Tuesday, hoping to scuttle the launch ahead of the nation's own plans to launch a similar contract.
The underlying barometer, compiled by FTSE/Xinhua Index, tracks the biggest 50 Shanghai and Shenzhen-traded stocks by market value, and the two exchanges provide the data to the index firm.
The Shanghai exchange yesterday alleged FTSE/Xinhua Index violated intellectual property and indicated it won't renew the contract, due to expire in October, to let the index firm use the data to compile the index.