MNI China Press Digest, July 8: Stock, GDP, US-China

     BEIJING (MNI) - The following lists highlights from Chinese press reports

on Thursday:

     The China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) has published a list of

258 companies providing unregulated off-floor financing to stock investors. In

publishing the list on Wednesday, the regulator vowed to continue to crack down

on this type of illegal funding activity for stock market speculation. Economic

Information Daily quoted Yang Delong, the chief economist with the First

Seafront Fund, who said the CSRC is taking action now to prevent investors from

taking on too much leverage, and is seeking to prevent a repeat of the 2015

crisis when over-leveraged funds flowed into the market.

     Chinese market participants anticipate Q2 GDP growth will be between 2% to

3%, up from -6.8% in Q1 due to improving domestic demand, according to the

Shanghai Securities Journal. Lian Ping, the chief economist with Zhixin Fund,

told the Journal that retail sales should also increase to 2.5% after a fall of

2.8% in May as the government adopted policies to boost the people's spending,

despite new Covid-19 cases in several cities leading to regional lockdowns.

     China is willing to revive talks with the U.S. at any level and at any

time, said China's Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi on Thursday. In comments

published on the ministry's website from his address to a virtual forum on

U.S.-China relations, Wang said the two countries should not allow the

relationship to decouple, and should stick to the path of dialogue and

cooperation. Wang also said the U.S. should stop politicising the Covid-19

pandemic and the two countries should cooperate on fighting the pandemic on a

global scale.

--MNI Beijing Bureau; +86 (10) 8532-5998; email: archie.zhang@marketnews.com

--MNI Sydney Bureau; +61 405322399; email: lachlan.colquhoun.ext@marketnews.com

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