(Yicai) Sept. 30 -- The Chinese mainland bourses saw a record day after three of China’s four largest first-tier cities rolled out sweeping measures over the weekend to spur the flagging real estate market. The surge extends the gains seen last week after the central government introduced a hefty financial stimulus package.

Turnover on the Shanghai and Shenzhen markets skyrocketed 80 percent today from the previous trading day to CNY2.6 trillion (USD370.7 billion), an all-time high.

The Shanghai Composite Index soared 8.1 percent to close at 3,336.5, the Shenzhen Component Index surged 10.7 percent to 10,529.76 and Shenzhen’s Nasdaq-style ChiNext Index jumped 15.4 percent to 2,175.09. 

In an unprecedented rebound, the Shanghai Composite Index has swelled 21.4 percent in the past five trading days, while the Shenzhen Component Index has increased 30.3 percent and the ChiNext Index by 42.1 percent.

Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen will ease property purchase curbs, lower mortgage downpayments as well as cut taxes and fees on housing sales, among other measures to get the real estate sector out of the doldrums, the municipal governments said yesterday.

It follows a slew of financial stimulus measures that were announced by the People’s Bank of China on Sept. 24 and officially adopted later. They include reducing the reserve requirement ratio by 0.5 percentage point, trimming the central bank's policy interest rate, which is the seven-day reverse repo operation rate, by 0.2 percentage point, and cutting the interest rate on existing mortgages by 0.5 percentage point. 

Such was the volume of trades, that it resulted in system glitches at the Shanghai Stock Exchange, causing many trading orders to fail on Sept. 27. The Shanghai bourse is exploring boosting its system’s capacity to ensure normal operations after the week-long National Day holiday which begins tomorrow, Yicai learned from a source today.

The trading platforms of brokers such as Citic Securities and Shenwan Hongyuan Securities have also crashed in the past few days, unable to cope with the number of trades, Shanghai Securities News reported today. Some securities firms have opened back up sites to deal with the extra volume, it added.

Trading will resume on the mainland stock markets on Oct. 8.

Editor: Kim Taylor