China stocks fell on Tuesday as the market weighed new guidelines on pension products and recent comments by the central bank governor that some short-term speculative funds may be leaving the country.
Financial shares, primarily brokerage and insurance stocks, led indices lower.
The CSI300 index fell 0.8 per cent, to 3,223.12 points at the end of the morning session, while the Shanghai Composite Index lost 0.8 per cent, to 2,995.14 points.
China CSI300 stock index futures for April fell 0.3 per cent, to 3,198.2, or 24.92 points below the current value of the underlying index.
Governor Zhou Xiaochuan’s comments on Sunday about short-term funds came in the context of saying recent data showed an easing of capital outflows.
“There are several factors pushing financial shares lower today, but uncertainty over the meaning of Zhou Xiaochuan’s comments for the equity market is one,” said Zhang Gang, analyst at China Central Securities in Shanghai.
Another is the guidelines on pension products jointly issued after the close of trading on Monday by the central bank and several top ministries.
The guidelines are intended to encourage financial firms to develop products for the elderly with long-term and stable yields to meet their pension needs.
The Hang Seng index dropped 0.4 per cent to 20,609.84 points.
The Hong Kong China Enterprises Index lost 0.6 per cent to 8,873.89.
The index measuring price differences between dual-listed companies in Shanghai and Hong Kong stood at 134.81.
A value above 100 indicates Shanghai shares are pricing at a premium to shares in the same company trading in Hong Kong, and vice versa.
The northbound quota for the Hong Kong-Shanghai Stock Connect, currently set at 13 billion yuan, saw net inflows of 1.25 billion yuan.
Total volume of A shares traded in Shanghai was 15.45 billion shares, while Shenzhen volume was 16.39 billion shares.
Total trading volume of companies included in the HSI index was 0.5 billion shares.