Four of the five most popular shares with foreign investors who boarded the “through train” joining the Hong Kong and Shanghai stock exchanges yesterday were state-owned enterprises. This is no coincidence: Shanghai is the market of choice for state companies, while privately owned, consumer-focused companies tend to choose Shenzhen.
It underlines one of the main risks for investors now able to put just over $2bn a day into China, via the Shanghai-Hong Kong Stock Connect. Shenzhen, which makes up 40 per cent of China’s equities by market value, is not included, making it hard for foreigners to bet on China successfully rebalancing from an investment-dominated to a consumption-orientated economy.
Still, there are more than 1,000 stocks to choose from (Shenzhen has 1,600). They are also cheaper. Shanghai trades at under nine times expected earnings, compared to more than 20 times for Shenzhen – more than the US.