A prominent National People’s Congress deputy and Peking University professor, Tian Xuan, has proposed a two‑pronged reform to deepen China’s capital‑market opening: lengthen A‑share trading hours in stages and establish a nationwide, non‑profit association for independent directors under the supervision of the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC). The proposals, made ahead of the 2026 Two Sessions, are pitched as practical steps to improve price discovery, attract foreign capital and shore up corporate governance for the country’s more than 5,400 listed firms.
Tian argues that China’s current regular trading session—roughly four hours a day, excluding pre‑market auction—has become anachronistic relative to global peers and ill suited to a market that the authorities are trying to make more open and institutional. He recommends a phased approach: first push the afternoon close to 16:00 to align with Hong Kong, then extend the morning session to reach 5.5 hours, and ultimately move the opening earlier to 9:00 to approach a six‑hour trading day comparable to major exchanges. Complementary measures would include stronger digital risk‑control systems at the regulator level and upgraded electronic trading and hedging services from brokerages.
The rationale is straightforward: longer trading hours can raise intraday liquidity, compress information asymmetries, and reduce the incidence of missed trades across a market with thousands of listed companies. Tian frames the change as a precondition for deeper two‑way opening and greater foreign participation, arguing that short trading windows limit pricing efficiency and deter overseas investors who face timezone mismatches and narrower opportunities to transact.
On corporate governance, Tian says the independent‑director (ID) system—central to protecting minority shareholders—has been weakened by implementation gaps, inconsistent selection practices and inadequate protections for IDs who face liability risks. He cites high‑profile accounting scandals such as Kangmei Pharmaceutical as evidence that the current regime needs institutional reinforcement. His proposal envisions a CSRC‑overseen national independent‑directors association whose board would be composed of at least 50% independent directors and which would set unified qualification standards, deliver tiered training and certification, operate information and duties‑support platforms, run performance evaluation and disciplinary mechanisms, and promote tailored liability insurance to reduce deterrent risks to effective oversight.
Both measures would require significant operational and regulatory work. Extending trading hours touches clearing and settlement schedules, intraday margining, market‑making arrangements and the architecture for cross‑border trading links. It may also accelerate the role of algorithmic trading and require brokers to bear extra technology and hedging costs. The association proposal raises its own questions about independence, enforcement powers and the risk that a centrally sanctioned body becomes bureaucratic rather than genuinely practitioner‑led.
If well designed and genuinely implemented, the twin reforms could help rebalance China’s market structure: more continuous trading could support better price discovery and attract international flows, while a professionalised ID ecosystem could reduce governance failings that have dented retail investor confidence. Neither outcome is automatic; both depend on regulatory follow‑through, resource allocation and careful calibration of incentives and liabilities across market participants.