China's small and medium-sized enterprises expressed more confidence in the first quarter as the government's stimulus measures for the sector boosted the owners' sentiment, Standard Chartered Bank said yesterday.

The China SME Confidence Index added 3.06 points to 57.63 from the previous three-month period, the bank said in a report. A reading above 50 suggests optimism among SMEs about business conditions.

"Seasonal factors and new project launches by SMEs pushed up the index, and government stimulus measures also played an active role," said Betty Ku, the bank's northeast Asian and China head of SME banking.

The quarterly survey covered 1,000 SMEs in 20 cities, the bank said.

Among the four sub-indices, the operation confidence index and investment confidence index posted the highest readings while those for the macro-economic confidence and financing confidence were relatively low.

Meanwhile, a separate report by China UnionPay showed that confidence among Chinese bankcard holders edged up in March as their spending on non-daily necessities rose.