Beijing Stock Exchange sets investor thresholds

Beijing Stock Exchange sets investor thresholds.

Photo from CFP

Photo from CFP

By WANG Xin

 

Individual investors should have at least 500,000 yuan (US$77,500) in their accounts before trading on the planned Beijing Stock Exchange, according to rules proposed on September 17. There is no threshold for institutional investors.

The requirement is lower for trading on the New Third Board, the over-the-counter trading platform which gave rise to the new exchange. The New Third Board was launched in 2012 to serve smaller, mostly innovation-driven, companies that do not meet the requirements of the Shanghai or Shenzhen exchanges.

The 500,000-yuan minimum refers to the average daily value of assets in the 20 trading days prior to registration, which opened on Friday. This is substantially less than the 1-million-yuan that was previously required to trade in the top tier of the New Third Board. Individual investors must also have at least two years of trading experience. As few as 3 million or as many as 7 million investors may have already been eligible on the opening day.

Access to the Innovative Tier has been lowered to 1 million yuan from 1.5 million yuan to “significantly increase” volumes and liquidity.