DeepSeek revolutionises stock trading as China's retail investors embrace AI
If you cannot fight them, join them, is the mantra among Chinese retail investors who are embracing DeepSeek and other artificial intelligence (AI) tools, in sharp contrast with last year's government crackdown on computer-driven quantitative traders.
Advertisement
Online crash courses have mushroomed and training rooms are packed with retail traders eager to beat the market using computer models, as the popularity of DeepSeek – itself backed by a quant fund – changed not only the market trajectory, but the perception of China's US$700 billion hedge fund industry.
The rapid adoption of DeepSeek in China's retail-dominated stock market is also prompting changes at brokerages and wealth managers, while creating new risks for investors in a market dominated and driven by small-time traders' cash flow.
'The future is the digital age, and AI will be vital,' Hong Yangjun told a packed room of individual investors learning to trade with AI on a weekend in February.
A woman walks by an electronic board displaying Chinese stock indices. Photo: AP Photo
Just as future warfare will be fought with drones and robots, the stock market will be a battleground between computers, the lecturer told the class in an office in downtown Shanghai.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
RTHK
5 hours ago
- RTHK
Tech losses lead Hang Seng Index to lower close
Tech losses lead Hang Seng Index to lower close The benchmark Hang Seng Index ended the day down 331.56 points, or 1.36 percent, to close at 24,035.38. File photo: RTHK Stocks in mainland China and Hong Kong ended mostly lower on Thursday, led by declines in the tech sector, as markets struggled to sustain the positive momentum from the Sino-US trade talks that lacked concrete details. In Hong Kong, the benchmark Hang Seng Index ended the day down 331.56 points, or 1.36 percent, to close at 24,035.38. The Hang Seng China Enterprises Index slid 1.53 percent to end at 8,729.96 while the Hang Seng Tech Index slumped 2.20 percent to 5,331.33. Mainland Chinese stocks ended up mixed, with the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index up 0.01 percent at 3,402.66 and the Shenzhen Component Index closed 0.11 percent down at 10,234.33 The ChiNext Index, tracking China's Nasdaq-style board of growth enterprises, gained 0.26 percent to close at 2,067.15. Among major losers, chipmaker SMIC fell 2 percent to a one-week low. Alibaba weakened 3.2 percent and EV maker Xpeng slid 6.7 percent. The CSI Rare Earth Index closed flat after slipping nearly 1 percent in the morning session and continued to hover near its seven-month high. A trade truce between the world's two biggest economies was back on track, US President Donald Trump said, a day after negotiators from Washington and Beijing agreed on a framework to ease bilateral retaliatory tariffs. Under the agreement, Beijing will lift export curbs on rare earth minerals and the United States will restore Chinese students' access to its universities, Trump said on Truth Social. Yet the terms remain subject to final approvals, with details notably absent. The 55 percent tariffs on Chinese imports will also stay, US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said. "We still don't know if what Trump says will actually happen. It's disappointing that the tariffs rates were not dialled down at all and tech curbs on China were not even mentioned," said Jason Chan, senior investment strategist at Bank of East Asia, Hong Kong. The talks left key issues, like chip exports, unaddressed, leaving room for conflicts in the future, and no one knows for how long the current truce will last, he added. Chinese markets have been struggling to recover from trade shocks for the past two months after Trump announced sweeping tariffs on April 2 that threatened the global trade system. The CSI 300 Index has barely eked out any gains since then, while the Hang Seng Index has climbed 3.5 percent, but the two are underperforming the nearly 10 percent bounce in the MSCI World Index . The market is less sensitive to trade talks and investors are shifting focus to economic fundamentals, Wang Zhuo, partner at Zhuozhu Investment, said. "The key for China now is to bolster manufacturers' confidence and break the deflationary trend." (Reuters/Xinhua)
RTHK
12 hours ago
- RTHK
HK stocks down as investors gauge Sino-US trade deal
HK stocks down as investors gauge Sino-US trade deal Investors adopted a cautious attitude as details of the trade agreement between Beijing and Washington remain scarce. File photo: RTHK Hong Kong and mainland stocks fell on Thursday, led by declines in the rare-earth and tech sectors, as markets struggled to sustain positive momentum from Sino-US trade talks that provided few concrete details. A deal getting the fragile truce in the trade war back on track was reached after negotiators from Beijing and Washington agreed on a framework covering tariff rates, US President Donald Trump said on Wednesday. The deal removes Chinese export restrictions on rare-earths minerals and allows Chinese students access to US universities, but many specifics and detailed terms were absent, leaving investors cautious. China's blue-chip CSI300 Index fell 0.6 percent from a three-week high touched in the previous session. Hong Kong's benchmark Hang Seng index lost 0.7 percent to pull back from its highest level in nearly three months. The CSI Rare Earth Index slipped 0.8 percent from a seven-month high, and the semiconductor sector subindex slid more than 1 percent. In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng Tech Index lost 1.5 percent in early trades. (Reuters)
RTHK
14 hours ago
- RTHK
After 3 up days, S&P 500 falls on trade announcement
After 3 up days, S&P 500 falls on trade announcement Besides trade, markets on Wall Street also digested key US inflation data. Photo: AFP Wall Street stocks finished lower on Wednesday despite positive movement in the US-China trade conflict and a benign US inflation report. Following two days of talks in London, top US and Chinese negotiators announced a "framework" agreement late on Tuesday, but stocks fell in what described as a "sell the news" response to a breakthrough that had been largely priced in. The S&P 500, which rose the last three days, finished down 0.3 percent at 6,022. The Dow Jones was flat at 42,865, while the Nasdaq dropped 0.5 percent to 19,615. Besides trade, markets digested key inflation data. US consumer prices rose 2.4 percent compared with a year ago, up from a 2.3 percent reading for the prior month, a modest uptick that analysts said still did not fully reflect the impact of Trump's tariffs. Sam Stovall of CFRA Research described Wednesday's session as a "rollercoaster," positing that the negative finale may reflect unease at reports Trump could appoint a "shadow" Federal Reserve Chair to try to influence monetary policy without firing Fed Chair Jerome Powell. Stovall also highlighted the possibility that "the market is overbought and due for some sort of digestion of gains." Among those falling, large tech names including Amazon, Facebook parent Meta and Apple lost more than one percent. (AFP)
