• Asian stock markets perform well on Monday
• Chinese banks experience strong gains
• • Wall Street also showed strong growth yesterday

Over the last few days, China’s stock market has surged ahead, scoring more than 2.9% or 80 points in the process. The Shanghai Composite Index now stands slightly above the 2,815-point level, and it should open in the green again today.

International projections for Asian markets remain positive after support from oil prices and subsiding tensions over a trade war. The US and European markets also ended higher yesterday, and the Asian exchanges should follow their example.

The SCI ended higher yesterday after gains from properties, financials, insurance and oil stocks. It gained 2.47% or 67.88 points to end at 2,815.11. The Shenzhen Composite Index, meanwhile, ended 2.51% or 38.56 points higher at 1,574.54.

Bank of China surged by 4.17%, while China Construction Bank ended 5.42% higher. Industrial and Commerce Bank of China, China Merchants Bank, China Minsheng Bank, China Petroleum, China Life, Petro China, Baoshan Iron, China Shenhua Energy, and China Vanke all posted strong increases.

Chinese consumer prices are expected to increase by 1.9% annually, while producer price inflation is expected to rise by 4.5%.

On Wall Street, stocks ended strongly higher yesterday, building on the good performance of the previous session.

The Dow Jones surged by 1.31% or 320.11 points to reach 24,776.59. The NASDAQ, meanwhile, ended the day 0.88% or 67.81 points higher at 7,756.20, while the S&P 500 ended 0.88% or 24.35 points higher at 2,784.17.

Much of this can be attributed to an earlier report from the Labor Department indicating better-than-expected job growth last month.

Banking stocks increased substantially, as did oil service shares. Crude oil prices increased marginally on a day during which the dollar didn’t move much. August WTI edged up 5 cents to $73.85/bbl.