Listed Chinese securities firms total net profit dips 79% in Q3

Oct. 31, 2008 (China Knowledge) - China's eight publicly traded securities companies, which are listed in the Shanghai Stock Exchange or the Shenzhen Stock Exchange, booked combined net profit of RMB 2.026 billion in the third quarter, down 79% from a year earlier, mainly due to decreased brokerage income and underwriting fees caused by the sluggish stock market, according to sources.

Excluding Pacific Securities<601099>, which suffered net loss of RMB 88.46 million in the period, the rest seven firms all posted net profits.

Sinolink Securities<600109>, which started trading in Shanghai after a backdoor listing in February, posted net profit of RMB 184.49 million during the quarter, compared with RMB 122.89 million raked in a year earlier,

The top two brokers, CITIC Securities<600030> and Haitong Securities<600837> said net profit dropped 72.8% and 68.8% year on year to RMB 1.13 billion and RMB 640.57 million respectively.

Other four listed securities companies, namely Hong Yuan Securities<000562>, Northeast Securities<000686>, Guoyuan Securities<000728> and Changjiang Securities<000783>, each posted year-on-year decrease of over 90% in Q3 net profit.

During the period, the average earnings per share (EPS) of the eight listed firms fell 87% year-on-year to RMB 0.08. Of the total, only EPS of CITIC Securities and Sinolink Securities was above the average level, to stand at RMB 0.17 and RMB 0.37 respectively.

As of the end of the third quarter, the total asset and net asset of these eight firms fell to RMB 291 billion and RMB 111.3 billion respectively.