China punishes more securities market violations

China's securities regulator said on Friday that it exposed more stock and futures market violations in the first ten months of 2013 and imposed a total of 148.76 million yuan (24.24 million U.S. dollars) in fines. From January to October, the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) handled 486 reports on violations of the China's securities and futures markets, up 44 percent from one year earlier, according to a CSRC online statement. During the same period, the commission launched 286 investigations, up 25 percent year on year. It also assisted in 74 new investigations concerning foreign interests, up 35 percent from a year ago. It collected fines and confiscated illegal gains that totaled 148.76 million yuan, nearly three times that of the same period last year. As many as 54 percent of the violation cases, including insider trading, information disclosure violations and market manipulation, were reported by the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges, and another 25 percent came from public tip-offs. China has strengthened securities supervision and cracked down harder on stock market violations this year. In August, the CSRC decided to impose record penalties totaling 523 million yuan on Everbright Securities, as the company's abnormal trading on Aug. 16 caused temporary spikes in the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index and resulted in huge losses for those who followed to buy in.