Fund Used to Bailout Stock Markets Lose 12 percent in Value

(Beijing) – Securities firms that invested 220-billion-yuan with state-backed China Securities Finance Corp. (CSF) to buy shares at the behest of the regulator to prop up the country's plunging stock market last year suffered a 12-Pct loss as of April, executives from two firms involved in the deal said.

The investments were part of a massive government-backed bailout of the A-share market, which went into a tailspin last summer, resulting in the worst crash in more than seven years. The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index (SCI) dipped from 5,178 points on June 12 to less than 3,000 points in just over two months. The rescue operations, coordinated by CSF plowed a total of at least 2 trillion yuan into the stock market to stabilize it from July to August.