Stock market advice for China: when in a hole, stop digging

With ham-fisted interventions, Beijing has turned the stock market into a giant game of guessing how long its props will last. But it is unlikely to change tack

Even by recent Chinese standards, the latest stock market plunge was spectacular. Nearly 1,800 stocks - or more than 60% of shares on the main markets in Shanghai and Shenzhen - fell by the daily limit of 10%, thereby triggering a trading suspension. If such a limit had not been in operation, who knows where prices might have settled. An 8.5% overall fall in the Shanghai Composite might have been 18.5% or 28.5%. Almost any guess is credible.

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