China stocks poised to reopen Tuesday with markets fixated on fiscal stimulus

Chinese investors are looking for more policy direction from China's top economic planning body on Tuesday, when mainland markets return from a week-long holiday.  

A panel of senior officials from the National Development and Reform Commission, including chairman Zheng Shanjie, will brief reporters on the implementation of stimulus policies at the press conference on Tuesday at 10 a.m. local time, according to the notice from the State Council on Sunday. 

Economists and traders are closely watching for additional policy measures as Beijing has signaled a sense of urgency in bringing its economy back on track to hit the annual growth target of "around 5%." 

Before the week-long holiday, authorities unveiled a flurry of stimulus policies, including interest rate cuts, lower cash reserve requirements at banks, looser property purchase rules and liquidity support for stock markets.

Chinese major indexes have surged over 25% as investors cheer on the barrage of stimulus measures. Last week, China's CSI 300 blue-chip index extended a nine-day winning streak, surging over 8% Monday, before the market closed for a week-long holiday. Hong Kong stocks, however, reopened Wednesday last week and traded above 23,000 on Monday for the first time since 2022.

The futures contracts tied to MSCI China A50 Connect Index, which tracks 50 mega-cap stocks in the A-share market, have surged nearly 15% since Sept. 30, to 2,536.6 as of 2:30 p.m. on Monday. The SGX FTSE China A50 Index futures also surged 12.7% to 15,672 over the same holiday period.

Ever since Beijing pledged a ramp-up in fiscal spending on Sept. 26, the market has been waiting for specifics, said Erica Tay, director of macro research at Maybank Investment Banking Group, "it will be