China Stock Market May Pick Up Steam On Monday

(RTTNews) - The China stock market on Friday halted the three-day slide in which it had slumped almost 45 points or 1.6 percent. The Shanghai Composite Index now sits just above the 2,860-point plateau and it's expected to open to the upside again on Monday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is positive on optimism over the outlook for interest rates. The European and U.S. markets were up and the Asian bourses figure to open in similar fashion.

The SCI finished slightly higher on Friday as gains from the financials and oil companies were capped by weakness from the property sector.

For the day, the index rose 5.60 points or 0.20 percent to finish at 2,854.37 after trading between 2,839.34 and 2,860.73. The Shenzhen Composite Index was up 1.14 points or 0.08 percent to end at 1,506.22.

Among the actives, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China collected 0.62 percent, while Bank of China and Agricultural Bank of Chin both perked 0.20 percent, China Construction Bank added 0.24 percent, China Merchants Bank climbed 1.20 percent, China Life Insurance rallied 2.13 percent, Aluminum Corp of China (Chalco) and Jiangxi Copper both rose 0.30 percent, Yankuang Energy gained 0.29 percent, PetroChina increased 0.34 percent, China Petroleum and Chemical (Sinopec) advanced 1.19 percent, Huaneng Power slumped 1.25 percent, China Shenhua Energy improved 0.88 percent, Gemdale retreated 1.45 percent, Poly Developments lost 0.63 percent and China Vanke dropped 0.93 percent.

The lead from Wall Street is upbeat as the major averages opened higher on Friday and spent the whole day in the green, ending near session highs.

The Dow jumped 462.28 points or 1.14 percent to finish at 41,175.08, while the NASDAQ rallied 258.39 points or 1.47 percent to end at 17,877.79 and the S&P 500 advanced 63.97 points or 1.15 percent to close at 5,634.61.

For the week, the Dow shot up 1.3 percent, the NASDAQ jumped 1.4 percent and the S&P 500 spiked 1.5 percent.

The rebound on Wall Street came as highly anticipated remarks by Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell indicated the central bank is prepared to begin lowering interest rates at its next monetary policy meeting in September.

In other U.S. economic news, the Commerce Department noted a substantial increase by new home sales in the U.S. in July.

Following the rebound in the previous session, the price of crude oil showed another strong move to the upside on Friday. West Texas Intermediate crude for October delivery surged $1.82 or 2.5 percent to $74.83 a barrel after jumping $1.08 or 1.5 percent to $73.01 a barrel during Thursday's session. But the price of crude oil fell by 0.9 for the week due to sell-off earlier in the week.