Margin trading licenses out soon

Domestic brokerages may be issued margin trading licenses within the month, the South China Morning Post reported. The first companies to be allowed to lend money to clients to buy stocks and bonds are likely to be Citic Securities, Orient Securities and maybe Guotai Junan Securities. At least five other companies have applied to the China Securities Regulatory Commission to offer margin trading and all may be eventually approved, the newspaper said. These companies are among a dozen or so of China's 109 brokerages named "innovative companies" by the regulator, a title which allows them to apply to provide new financial products. The scope of margin trading is expected to be quite small at first, no more than the daily turnover of the Shenzhen and Shanghai exchanges during peak season, which is less than US$1.34 billion.