BEIJING (dpa-AFX) - The China stock market has moved lower in consecutive trading days, slipping more than 55 points or 1.7 percent along the way. The Shanghai Composite now sits just above the 3,265-point plateau and it's looking at another soft start again on Thursday.
The global forecast for the Asian markets is negative on mixed corporate and economic news. The European and U.S. markets finished under water and the Asian bourses are expected to open in similar fashion.
The SCI finished modestly lower on Wednesday as losses from the financials and resource stocks were mitigated by support from the property sector.
For the day, the index shed 20.17 points or 0.61 percent to finish at 3,266.24 after trading between 3,244.81 and 3,291.68. The Shenzhen Composite Index perked 0.69 points or 0.04 percent to end at 1,973.62.
Among the actives, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China dropped 0.83 percent, while Bank of China retreated 1.43 percent, China Construction Bank skidded 1.12 percent, China Merchants Bank tumbled 1.87 percent, Agricultural Bank of China declined 1.67 percent, China Life Insurance tanked 2.31 percent, Jiangxi Copper plunged 3.18 percent, Aluminum Corp of China (Chalco) plummeted 7.90 percent, Yankuang Energy shed 0.58 percent, PetroChina slumped 1.10 percent, China Petroleum and Chemical (Sinopec) lost 0.64 percent, Huaneng Power surrendered 2.20 percent, China Shenhua Energy sank 1.32 percent, Gemdale surged 5.23 percent, Poly Developments added 0.47 percent and China Vanke advanced 0.99 percent.
The lead from Wall Street is soft as the major averages opened lower on Wednesday but then bounced higher for most of the day before a late slump saw them finish in the red.
The Dow dropped 91.51 points or 0.22 percent to finish at 42,141.54, while the NASDAQ tumbled 104.82 points or 0.56 percent to close at 18,607.93 and the S&P 500 sank 19.25 points or 0.33 percent to end at 5,813.67.
The choppy trading came as investors reacted to a mixed batch of corporate earnings as Alphabet (GOOGL) and Snap (SNAP) rallied after good results, while Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) and Caterpillar (CAT) stumbled after disappointing.
On the U.S. economic front, payroll processor ADP said private sector employment in the U.S. shot up much more than anticipated in October, although a a separate report released by the Commerce Department showed U.S. economic growth unexpectedly slowed in the third quarter.
Oil prices moved higher on Wednesday after data showed an unexpected drop in U.S. crude inventories last week and on reports that OPEC may delay its planned output increase. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for December closed up $1.40 or 2.1 percent at $68.61 a barrel.
Closer to home, China will see October results later this morning for the manufacturing, non-manufacturing and composite indexes from the National Bureau of Statistics; in September, their scores were 49.8, 50.0 and 50.4, respectively.
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