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 The People's Bank of China also raised its guidance rate for the
yuan for the first time in nine trading days, having allowed the
currency's biggest fall in five months on Thursday, sending shivers
through regional currencies and global stock markets as investors
feared it would trigger competitive devaluations.
Chinese markets have had a turbulent start to 2016, buffeted by the
PBOC's lower yuan fixings against the dollar, two days of stock
exchange suspensions, weak factory and service sector surveys, and
worries about looming share sales by major stakeholders once a ban
on such sales expires.
With the stocks circuit breaker deactivated late on Thursday, the
CSI300 index closed up 2 percent at 3,361.56 points on Friday, while
the Shanghai Composite Index also closed up 2 percent at 3,186.41
points.
The CSI300 had lost around 12 percent in the first four trading days
of 2016, giving up all the gains made in 2015.
The circuit breaker, which only came into effect on Jan. 4, came
under fire for kicking in too soon with its initial pause in
trading, and then encouraging a rush to sell before a second trigger
halted the day's trade permanently.
"The market is back to normal," said Tian Weidong, analyst at
Kaiyuan Securities. "Investors can buy and sell as they wish. Under
the circuit breaker mechanism, the market was suffocated."
John Woods, Chief Investment Officer, Asia-Pacific, at Credit
Suisse's private bank said the turmoil seen this week was likely to
be a "short, sharp shock" similar to last summer's China stocks
crash, which ironically first convinced the stocks regulator of the
need for a circuit breaker.
To calm currency markets, the PBOC set its daily midpoint rate for
the yuan at 6.5636 per dollar prior to market open, firmer than
Thursday's fix at 6.5646 and closing quote of 6.5929. Under China's
currency regime the yuan is allowed to deviate 2 percent either side
of the midpoint.
The yuan firmed during the day, with dealers suspecting that the
central bank intervened through state-run banks to support its
currency, which could help allay fears that any depreciation would
be allowed to continue.
The onshore yuan was at 6.5894 at around 0730 GMT, while the
offshore yuan was about 1.4 percent weaker at 6.6860, narrowing a
spread that reached around 2 percent a day earlier.
CALL FOR CLARITY
Since the PBOC devalued the yuan by about 2 percent last August, the
onshore-offshore spread had been growing, encouraging an outflow of
capital that Beijing has been struggling to stem through measures
including halting some forex business by a number of foreign banks,
and ordering banks in some trading hubs to limit clients' dollar
purchases, sources have told Reuters.
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"While the market was left with uncertainty on how far the yuan will
fall, the Chinese central bank's action (the stronger fix on Friday)
was taken as a signal that it does not intend to keep allowing the
yuan to fall," said Yoshinori Shigemi, a market strategist at
JPMorgan Asset Management.
After its sharply lower fix on Thursday, the PBOC had later sown
confusion by reportedly intervening heavily to defend the yuan in
offshore trade, reversing a decline of more than 1 percent that took
it to a record low of 6.7600 per dollar.
That left dealers at a loss to know what the central bank's aims
were. "Market volatility this week suggests that nobody really knows
what the policy is right now. Or if the government itself knows or
is capable of implementing the policy even if there is one," said
DBS bank.
"The market's message was loud and clear, that more clarity and less
flip-flopping is needed going forward."
Markets will remain wary of China's currency goals, as mixed
messages come from the central bank, which has repeatedly said it
sees no basis for the currency to depreciate, while steering it
gradually lower.
Sources told Reuters on Thursday that the PBOC is under increasing
pressure from policy advisers to let the currency fall quickly and
sharply, by as much as 10-15 percent, as its recent gradual
softening is thought to be doing more harm than good.
Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation said Friday's fix, however, gave
a better insight into PBOC policy, as it calculated that it returned
the yuan to around the 100 level on the RMB index, a basket of
currencies, against which the central bank has said it prefers to
benchmark the currency, rather than a direct dollar rate.
A flurry of Chinese economic data in the coming weeks is likely to
show economic activity continued to slow in December, adding to
concerns about the outlook for 2016.
(Reporting by Pete Sweeney and Lu Jianxin; Additional reporting by
Kevin Yao, Lisa Jucca, Kim Coghill and Samuel Shen; Writing by Will
Waterman; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore, Eric Meijer and Jacqueline
Wong)
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