The crowd in the packed Guosen Securities office jostles around buzzing printers that spit out receipts for their share buys, hoping to cash in on China's stimulus-fuelled stock market boom.
"The central government has to fulfill their promise of 8 per cent economic growth," said Wu Jun, 62, a retired civil servant who has part of his life savings of $7,300 (Dh26,800) in stocks and lives on a $290 a month pension. "They'll come up with measures to keep the market in good shape."
But while investors expect the market - up more than 80 per cent this year - to keep rising, Chinese leaders are alarmed. They worry that too much of the $1 trillion lending binge by state banks that paid for China's nascent revival was diverted into stocks and real estate, raising the danger of a boom and bust cycle and higher inflation less than two years after an earlier stock market bubble burst.
Beijing is trying to tighten credit controls without derailing the economic revival or causing a market crash - a risky path at a time when Chinese leaders say a recovery is not firmly established.
"It's a very serious threat. The Chinese government is walking a tightrope," said Mark Williams, Asia economist for Capital Economics in London. "There is the question of what happens if they rein in lending, because there is really no strong evidence that private sector demand is picking up."
Any hiccup in China's recovery could dent its rising demand for imported industrial raw materials and consumer goods, damaging hopes it might lead the global economy out of its worst downturn since the 1930s.
China's growth accelerated in the latest quarter to 7.9 per cent over a year earlier while the US and Europe struggle with recession.
"The central government has to fulfill their promise of 8 per cent economic growth," said Wu Jun, 62, a retired civil servant who has part of his life savings of $7,300 (Dh26,800) in stocks and lives on a $290 a month pension. "They'll come up with measures to keep the market in good shape."
But while investors expect the market - up more than 80 per cent this year - to keep rising, Chinese leaders are alarmed. They worry that too much of the $1 trillion lending binge by state banks that paid for China's nascent revival was diverted into stocks and real estate, raising the danger of a boom and bust cycle and higher inflation less than two years after an earlier stock market bubble burst.
Beijing is trying to tighten credit controls without derailing the economic revival or causing a market crash - a risky path at a time when Chinese leaders say a recovery is not firmly established.
"It's a very serious threat. The Chinese government is walking a tightrope," said Mark Williams, Asia economist for Capital Economics in London. "There is the question of what happens if they rein in lending, because there is really no strong evidence that private sector demand is picking up."
Any hiccup in China's recovery could dent its rising demand for imported industrial raw materials and consumer goods, damaging hopes it might lead the global economy out of its worst downturn since the 1930s.
China's growth accelerated in the latest quarter to 7.9 per cent over a year earlier while the US and Europe struggle with recession.
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