China to stop publishing daily global stock flows from mid-August

SHANGHAI - China is taking a further step to obscure information about overseas funds going into and out of its sagging stock market by saying it will stop publishing daily flows data from the middle of August.

The decision to cease publishing end-of-day data on the flows via Hong Kong was flagged back in April when the Shanghai and Shenzhen bourses also said they would stop displaying real-time information for that channel. The real-time data was terminated in May.

The second reduction in disclosure means it will be impossible to work out net purchases and sales of onshore stocks by overseas investors on any given day.

From Aug 18, the only daily data published by the exchanges will be the total turnover and the number of trades made in stocks and exchange-traded funds via the exchange links with Hong Kong, as well as the turnover of the 10 most active securities, according to statements from the Shanghai and Shenzhen exchanges on July 26.

Starting from the August date, the combined data on so-called northbound flows into individual stocks will be made available only quarterly, the exchanges also said. Data on the holdings of global investors in individual stocks will be released on the fifth trading day of each quarter, for the close of the previous period.

The latest retreat from disclosure can be seen as a further attempt by Chinese policymakers to prop up local investors’ faltering confidence, which has been battered by an outflow of global funds. Overseas money managers offloaded about 30 billion yuan (S$5.6 billion) of mainland shares from July 1 to 26, set for the biggest monthly outflow since October.

Real-time trading data for flows from mainland China to Hong Kong (referred to as southbound data) will still be available after the August deadline, a spokesperson at the Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing told Bloomberg in response to a request for clarification. BLOOMBERG