Three financial market watchdogs Tuesday jointly published a set of guidelines to clear the way for insurance companies investing in the domestic stock market.

The move, announced on the eve of the resumption of trading following Lunar New Year holidays, was evidently intended to provide a lift to the ailing stock market, which hovered around six-year lows in the final sessions before the week-long holiday.

The guidelines, jointly issued by the China Insurance Regulatory Commission (CIRC), the China Securities Regulatory Commission and the China Banking Regulatory Commission, provide technical details, including seats at bourses, asset custody and settlement, for insurance companies' investments.

The guidelines also apply to foreign insurance companies operating in China.

CIRC said in an announcement that the issuance of the guidelines is a substantial and practical breakthrough for insurance companies.

Many unanswered questions remain, such as which insurers will be the first to be approved to trade stocks and when they will do so.

In October, financial authorities said they would allow insurance companies to invest up to 5 percent of their total assets into the stock market.

In theory, that could usher 59.3 billion yuan (US$7.2 billion) into the stock markets in Shanghai and Shenzhen, which were worth 3.7 trillion yuan (US$445 billion) at the end of last year.

But so far, no insurance company has invested, since many technical issues remained up in the air.

The right to trade stocks will mean an important investment instrument for China's underwriters, which are pulling in huge premiums but are also facing obligations that are expected to peak in years ahead.

Tuesday's move also represented a fresh attempt by the government to boost investor sentiment in a stock market that lost 840 billion yuan (US$100 billion) in market value in 2004. The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index shed 15 percent in the same year.

Last month, financial authorities slashed the stamp tax rate on securities trading from 0.2 percent to 0.1 percent, but investors cold-shouldered the tariff cut.

Market analysts said investor confidence was weak because the underlying problem of the market -- nontradable state and legal entity shares -- is still unresolved.

In fact, tradable shares of China's stock market are worth less than one third of the total. The majority of the shares are in the hands of the listed firms' parent companies, almost all state-owned.

Smaller investors have no say in listed companies' decision-making processes, which is believed to be a major reason for poor corporate governance of the listed companies.

The government began to try to unload nontradable shares in 2001 but suspended the effort on fierce debate about the pricing system in the market.

(China Daily February 16, 2005)