China shares end higher as financials lead rebound

China's main stock indexes ended higher on Thursday, rebounding from two days of losses as gains in financial and consumer shares offset drops in health care, tech and new energy vehicle firms. ** At the close, the Shanghai Composite index was up 0.22% at 3,369.73. ** The blue-chip CSI300 index was up 0.18%, with its financial sector sub-index higher by 1.14%, the consumer staples sector up 0.3% and the healthcare sub-index down 0.46%. ** Industrial firms turned higher in the afternoon session. ** "Although there has been a marginal weakening of production activity since mid-November, many indexes including transactions, prices and inventories reflect terminal demand remains relatively strong," analysts at Huatai Securities said in a note. ** The new energy vehicle (NEV) sub-index fell 1.79%, on top of a 2.16% drop a day earlier on news that China's state planner has told local governments to investigate NEV projects linked to property developers Evergrande Group and Shenzhen Baoneng. ** The NEV sub-index remains up more than 64% in the year to date. ** The smaller Shenzhen index ended down 0.44% and the start-up board ChiNext Composite index was weaker by 0.235%. ** Around the region, MSCI's Asia ex-Japan stock index was 0.57% weaker, while Japan's Nikkei index closed up 0.91%. ** At 07:06 GMT, the yuan was quoted at 6.5683 per U.S. dollar, 0.18% firmer than the previous close of 6.58. ** So far this year, the Shanghai stock index is up 10.5% and the CSI300 has risen 20.1%, while China's H-share index listed in Hong Kong is down 4.4%. Shanghai stocks have risen 4.5% this month.