Shanghai's key stock index inched up in the morning session today as home appliance makers and milk producers led gains.
The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index jumped 0.10 percent, or 1.83 points, to 1,896.45 points at 11:30am.
The Shenzhen Composite Index, which tracks the smaller domestic market, was up 1.79 percent, or 9.93 points, to 564.54 points.
Gree Electric Appliances Co, a manufacturer of air-conditioners, and GD Midea Electric Appliances Co gained on speculation demand for home appliances will increase under a government plan to subsidize purchases.
Gree gained 5.76 percent to 19.65 yuan (US$2.87) while Midea jumped 4.74 percent to 9.51 yuan.
Bright Dairy & Food Ltd and Inner Mongolia Yili Industrial Group Co surged after the Telegraph reported Kohlberg Kravis Roberts will buy China's largest dairy farm.
Shanghai-based Bright Dairy gained 9.98 percent to 4.63 yuan while Yili advanced 9.83 percent to 8.83 yuan.
On the losing side, commodity shares performed weakly in the early session on concern a deepening global recession will hurt demand for raw materials.
Zhongjin Gold Co, China's second-biggest producer of the metal, and Shandong Gold Mining Co, the No. 3 producer, both dropped more than 5 percent after prices of the precious metal tumbled the most in eight months.
Gold fell 5.2 percent to US$776.80 an ounce on the Comex division of the New York Mercantile Exchange, the most since March 19. Crude oil declined 9.5 percent to US$49.28 a barrel, the lowest in more than three years, after the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries deferred a decision to reduce output.
Sinopec, as China Petroleum is known, dropped 1.35 percent to 8.04 yuan. Stockpiles at the refiner are "unreasonably high,'' China Petrochemical Corp, its parent company, said in its in-house newsletter today.
China Railway Erju Co, the unit of China Railway Group Ltd, said 529.8 million of its shares will become tradable on December 5, according to a statement to the stock exchange yesterday. China Railway Erju lost 2.47 percent to 8.29 yuan.
