1st LD-Writethru: Chinese stocks sink on Monday

Chinese stocks sank on Monday, dragged down by heavyweights.

The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index lost 5.33 percent to close at 3,016.7 points on Friday. The smaller Shenzhen index lost 6.21 percent to close at 10,212.46 points.

The ChiNext Index, the NASDAQ-style board of growth enterprises, lost 6.34 percent to close at 2,106.36 points.

Total turnover on the two bourses stood at 664.2 billion yuan (101.2 billion U.S. dollars).

Losers outnumbered gainers by 949 to 34 in Shanghai and 1,497 to 58 in Shenzhen.

The stock market opened lower and remained in negative territory for the day's trading, as both the Shanghai and Shenzhen indexes witnessed accelerated losses near closing.

Sub-indexes related to financial firms, aircraft manufacturing, ship-building and textiles were the most badly hit sectors on Monday.

Citic Securities declined by 6.83 percent to close at 15.68 yuan. China Merchants Securities lost 9.29 percent and closed at 16.79 yuan.

Avic Aircraft decreased by 8.26 percent and closed at 19.88 yuan.

The rough start for the Chinese capital market heightened investors' expectation for further monetary easing policies, while the absence of such news has disappointed investors.

According to a report from investment bank CICC, the pressure on the capital market could be the result of a blend of factors including the current fluctuation of the exchange rate, growing pressure from bad bank loans and sluggish employment, while the suspension of the "circuit-breaker" mechanism will hopefully help to mitigate the negative sentiment. Endit