Just over half, or 51.36 percent, of all stock investors showed no gains from China's bull market, while 48.6 percent gained more than 10 percent this year, according to a survey by the China Securities Journal.

The latest survey of investors' annual returns reflected feedback from 11,205 small and medium-scale investors.

About 13.5 percent of the respondents said their stock investment grew by 10 percent, and 16.8 percent said their returns ranged from 20 percent to 50 percent. Another 11 percent saw their accounts grow by 50 percent to 99 percent. Those whose investments doubled comprised about 7.2 percent.

The survey, carried out earlier this month, found that 13.5 percent of those polled broke even in 2007, while 16.6 percent said their investment shrank by 10 percent and 18.6 percent reported losses of 20 percent to 50 percent. About 2.4 percent of those polled said they lost more than half of their investment.

Public interest, strong corporate profits and double-digit economic growth helped drive up the key Shanghai Composite Index during much of 2007, with the index peaking at 6,092.06 points on October16 against the close of 2,675.47 points at the end of 2006.

Since then, China's stock market has weakened. The key index has been oscillating around the 5,000-point level over the past month.

But most investors still have an optimistic outlook for 2008, with 11 percent of those surveyed expecting less than 10 percent growth in their stock investments next year while 80.7 percent forecast gains of about 50 percent.

Also, 55.7 percent of the respondents said they would invest as much as they did in 2007. Another 26.7 percent said they would invest more while only 17.6 percent of investors said they would invest less or withdraw their money from the stock market.

About 70 percent of Chinese investors said they made profits in 2006, with those who lost accounting for only 16 percent, according to last year's survey by the China Securities Journal.

(Xinhua News Agency December 25, 2007)