China stimulus wasn't enough to convince retail investors to buy Chinese stocks
Instead, retail traders were motivated to take profits. This week, the Chinese government unveiled a slew of stimulus measures to boost its economy and get national GDP to an annual growth target of 5%. Chinese markets loved the news, with the CSI 300 index XX:000300 jumping 4.3% and Hang Seng HK:HSI gaining 4.1% on Tuesday and then continuing those gains throughout the week.Yet despite all the fervor, retail investors weren't convinced to buy in.Data from Vanda Research showed that retail investors' appetite for Chinese ETFs and ADRs remained at muted levels, much lower than in 2020 and 2021."Do not count on retail traders to get behind China's latest efforts to prop up their stock market. After getting burned repeatedly since 2021, retail appetite for Chinese equity ETFs and ADRs has fallen into deep bear market," Marco Iachini, senior vice president of research, and Lucas Mantle, vice president of data science, wrote in a Vanda Research note.Still, these gains resulted in more retai