Stocks retreat after two-day rally
Chinese stocks fell on Wednesday, ending a two-day rally, with the top-performing ChiNext Index plunging 4.49 percent.
The Shanghai Composite Index lost 1.09 percent to close at 3,026.95 points after hitting an intra-day low of 3,013.93 points and the smaller Shenzhen Component Index fell 2.53 percent to 9,592.06 points.
Total turnover for Shanghai and Shenzhen bourses hit 1.05 trillion yuan (US$156.4 billion), compared with 1.13 trillion yuan the previous day.
The ChiNext, China's Nasdaq-style board of growth enterprises that has outperformed other domestic benchmarks this year, suffered a major retreat to close at 1,693.86 points, a dive of 79.57 points from the day before. Turnover on the board dropped to 184 billion yuan from Tuesday's 212.6 billion yuan, which was the highest single-day trade volume in its history.
High-tech park development companies led the rises with an average growth of 6.88 percent for the entire sector. Biggest gainers included Beijing Electronic Zone Investment and Development Group, Shanghai Zhangjiang Hi-Tech Park Development Co and Nanjing Gaoke Co, which all rose by the 10-percent daily cap, as well as Shanghai Shibei Hi-Tech Co, which jumped 9.93 percent.
Financial shares, including banks and securities companies, continued to register sluggish performances. Lenders shed an average 1.4 percent while securities firms fell 2.18 percent.
Livestock- and poultry-raising firms, telecoms services providers and media companies, which were among the strongest gainers previously, all closed notably lower on Wednesday, losing 4.34 percent, 4.1 percent and 2.32 percent, respectively.
