Baoshan Iron Net Zooms; China Stocks Rally

Chandrasekhar Atreya
30 Aug, 2010
New York City

Stocks in China gained after the U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman made positive comments and showed willingness to expand balance sheet to purchase more Treasury bonds or housing loans. Profits at industrial companies in China soar in the first seven months. Baoshan Iron & Steel net surges 11-fold.

[R]5:00 PM Hong Kong, China – Stocks in China gained after the U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman made positive comments and showed willingness to expand balance sheet to purchase more Treasury bonds or housing loans. Profits at industrial companies in China soar in the first seven months. Baoshan Iron & Steel net surges 11-fold.[/R]

Chinese stocks rallied on Monday after the United States pledged to safeguard economic recovery, easing investor concerns. Hong Kong stocks also gained echoing mainland sentiments.

Hang Seng Index in Hong Kong added 0.68% or 139.87 to close at 20,737.22. The CSI 300 Index in China gained 1.97% or 56.44 to close at 2,915.01.

China announced Monday a global talent search to fill top posts at 12 major state-owned companies in its latest effort to improve performance at its huge but inefficient government firms.

The State Asset Supervision and Administration Commission wants “talented candidates from home and abroad” to help strengthen and develop companies, said a two-page advertisement in the China Daily, the main government newspaper aimed at foreign readers.

The posts include general managers for the State Nuclear Power Technology, the China State Construction Engineering and automaker Dongfeng Motor.

Russia officially launched on Sunday the Russian section of an oil pipeline that delivers east Siberian oil to China.

After the opening ceremony of the Eastern Siberia-Pacific Ocean pipeline held in Skovorodino in Amur region, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin hailed the pipeline as a multidimensional project to enhance Moscow-Beijing energy cooperation.

China will allow exporters to keep some foreign currency income overseas on a trial basis from October in its bid to balance international payment. The one-year trial will be launched in Guangdong, Shandong, and Jiangsu provinces as well as Beijing, the state administration of foreign exchange said yesterday on its Web site.

The state administration will grant approval to those that qualify and give them a quota that will allow them to maintain the foreign exchange overseas.

Management fees boosted net income of 18 fund companies by 22% in the first half of this year from the prior year period but left their investors buying such funds with huge losses.

The fund companies that had published first-half results by Wednesday earned a total of 2.34 billion yuan in the first half till June, Chinese financial data provider Wind Information said Friday.

Profits at industrial companies rose 61.1% in the first seven month till July from a year earlier, to 1.87 trillion yuan, the National Bureau of Statistics said Friday. The expansion weakened from 71.8% growth in the first half and 83% till May of the year.

Baoshan Iron & Steel, the listed unit of one of China’s leading steel mills, said its profits jumped 11-fold in the first half ended June, on higher prices and increased demand for the product.

Net profit climbed 1103.39% to 8.05 billion yuan in the first half to June and business revenue climbed 49.56% to 97.74 billion yuan, the company said in a statement to the Shanghai Stock Exchange on Saturday.

The top 100 privately owned businesses in Shanghai reported average revenues of 2.7 billion yuan last year according to a latest industrial survey. The profits surged 49% from the year before to 19.2 billion yuan.

The list containing the top 100 private enterprise of Shanghai which generated the most revenue compiled by the Shanghai Enterprises’ Association and Shanghai Federation of Industry and Commerce was unveiled over the weekend.

Shanghai Fosun High Technology, Huaye Iron & Steel Group and Shanghai People Enterprise Group raked the top three on the list.