Unlock the Editor’s Digest for free

Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.

Chinese shares jumped upon reopening after a weeklong holiday on Tuesday but officials stopped short of unveiling more fiscal stimulus measures, limiting further gains after a blistering market rally.

Investor expectations had built up that President Xi Jinping’s economic planners would on Tuesday detail their plans for greater fiscal spending to complement a monetary stimulus that propelled Chinese equities to their best week since 2008.

Zheng Shanjie, chair of the National Development and Reform Commission, China’s state economic planner, told reporters at a press conference in Beijing that he had “full confidence” the economy would reach its official full-year growth target of about 5 per cent.

However, markets were disappointed by the lack of significant new fiscal spending announcements from the NDRC, analysts said.

The blue-chip CSI 300 index of Shanghai- and Shenzhen-listed stocks opened 10.8 per cent higher on Tuesday before falling back to trade 4 per cent higher in early afternoon trading.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index fell as much as 9 per cent after rising 11 per cent over the previous five days.

“This is what happens when you feed the monster,” said Alicia García-Herrero, chief Asia-Pacific economist at Natixis. “Every day you need to increase the amount of food or it turns against you.”

Tuesday’s market moves came after institutions including Goldman Sachs, Citi and HSBC raised their targets for Chinese equity performance. The CSI 300 has risen more than 33 per cent over the past month.

Zheng said Chinese authorities would continue to issue ultra-long-dated sovereign bonds in 2025, an indication of more support for the economy. He also said the government would accelerate bond issuance to support growth, front-loading about Rmb200bn ($28bn) from next year’s budget for spending and investment projects.

He also pledged to prioritise consumption and expand domestic demand, which has lagged expectations, as well as strengthen support for China’s poor and students.

Chi Lo, senior Asia-Pacific strategist at BNP Paribas Asset Management, said the “core” fiscal stimulus measures observers had hoped for “weren’t really there today”.

“There is not enough conviction [in the market] that the Chinese authorities were coming out with forceful fiscal spending, accompanied by monetary easing, to get the system out of the doldrums.”

In response to a question about whether there would be new special local government bond issuance in the final two months of 2024 — an indication of greater fiscal support for ailing local administrations — NDRC deputy head Liu Sushe said policymakers were focused on realising the proceeds of existing special bonds.

Ting Lu, China economist at Nomura, forecast fiscal measures and other supportive policies in the next several months.

“The eventual scale and content of the fiscal package might be quite improvised and uncertain due to the brewing stock bubble and still-controversial debates on what Beijing should focus on,” he said.

China’s prospects of hitting its full-year GDP growth target, which is the lowest in decades, have been called into doubt this year as Xi’s administration struggles to reignite confidence among consumers and businesses in the world’s second-biggest economy.

Earlier on Tuesday, the World Bank said it was maintaining its 4.8 per cent growth projection for China’s economy for 2024. The multilateral lender projects China’s GDP growth to slow next year to 4.3 per cent.

Industrial metal prices, which are affected by expectations for China’s construction sector, dropped on Tuesday. CME copper futures fell about 2 per cent, while Dalian iron ore futures were down 1 per cent.

Aaditya Mattoo, the bank’s chief economist for east Asia and the Pacific, said the stimulus measures of recent weeks were “not a substitute for the deeper structural reforms needed to boost longer-term growth”.

“Given the lead time for fiscal policy implementation, most of the measures [and] bond proceeds will carry over into next year,” he said. “And even then, consumers may be reluctant to splurge because a one-time transfer would not boost longer-term incomes or address concerns about ageing, illness and unemployment.”

Analysts at Morgan Stanley suggested China’s finance ministry might hold a “follow-up press conference” to provide details on new measures.

But they added that there was “limited chance of meaningful demand stimulus” focused on consumers in the near term, adding that “sustainable reflation” still required a fiscal package of about Rmb10tn focused on consumption, debt restructuring and property.

A European spacecraft is heading to study an asteroid after NASA purposely knocked it off its course more than two years ago.

The European Space Agency’s (ESA) Hera spacecraft lifted off on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida at 10:52 a.m. ET on Monday.

It’s scheduled to conduct a “crash scene investigation,” researchers said.

Hera’s mission will focus on the asteroid Dimorphos, where a golf cart-sized spacecraft crashed on Sept. 26, 2022. That mission, called the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART), shortened Dimorphos’ orbit around Didymos, a bigger asteroid, by 33 minutes, researchers said.

The successful mission was only a test of the concept — to see, if an asteroid one day threatens to hit Earth, whether it could be pushed out of harm’s way.

On a series of flybys, Hera will survey Dimorphos’ mineral makeup and the dust surrounding it, the agency said. Its mission will also help scientists understand how big the crater is that was created during the DART mission, which they say could help in future asteroid deflections. Hera will also enable researchers to get a more accurate estimate of Dimorphos’ mass.

The top ESA official called Monday’s mission a “bold step” in ramping up the European agency’s role in defending the planet.

“Planetary defence is an inherently international endeavour, and I am really happy to see ESA’s Hera spacecraft at the forefront of Europe’s efforts to help protect Earth,” ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher said in a statement.

While in space, Hera will also conduct experiments and try “self-driving” navigation around both asteroids, the agency also said.

The asteroids are part of a binary asteroid system in which Dimorphos, at about 530 feet across, orbits Didymos, about half a mile across. The two asteroids are not a threat to Earth, according to NASA. Both came within roughly 6 million miles of Earth in 2022, according to the ESA.

Hera’s mission will also include “the first detailed survey” of Didymos.

The spacecraft is set to reach the asteroids in the fall of 2026, according to the ESA.

Unlock the US Election Countdown newsletter for free

The stories that matter on money and politics in the race for the White House

Hurricane Milton strengthened to a category five storm as it moved across the Gulf of Mexico on Monday, with US agencies warning of a possible life-threatening storm surge on the west coast of Florida and northern coast of the Yucatán Peninsula in Mexico.

The US National Hurricane Center upgraded the storm to the highest level on the Saffir-Simpson wind scale on Monday, saying its wind speed was as high as 180 miles per hour.

Milton is due to make landfall in Florida on Wednesday, and is expected to bring heavy rainfall and storm surges as high as 15 feet to the southern state, hitting areas still recovering from hurricanes Helene and Debby.

Hurricane Helene, a category four storm, caused flooding and mudslides across several southern US states less than two weeks ago, killing more than 225 people.

President Joe Biden declared a state of emergency in Florida late on Monday morning in advance of the hurricane’s arrival. Milton could cause the largest number of evacuations since Hurricane Irma in 2017, in which 6.7mn residents relocated, according to global risk advisory firm Guy Carpenter.

Florida governor Ron DeSantis said the state had suspended road tolls to make it easier for people to evacuate safely.

The speed and intensity of this year’s hurricanes have led scientists to raise the alarm on the frequency of “compound events”, or dangerous weather episodes that occur at the same time or in short succession, making it more difficult for communities to prepare and recover from natural disasters.

Climate change is increasing the frequency of compound events, according to the latest US government National Climate Assessment.

Milton moved from being declared a hurricane on Sunday afternoon to a category five storm by Monday morning. Its wind speed accelerated faster than all but two previously recorded storms, increasing by more than 90 miles an hour in less than 24 hours, the NHC said.

“I am stunned by how quickly this storm has intensified,” said Rachel Cleetus, policy director for climate and energy at the Union of Concerned Scientists.

“This is the unmistakable fingerprints of climate change that we are seeing here,” she added. As storms intensify more quickly and with less warning, the risk of serious harm and casualty increases, Cleetus said. “People have very little time to react to how strong a hurricane is going to be, and the scale of the devastation.”

For parts of Florida still recovering from Helene, “people are still reeling and resources are very stretched. That is going to make the harm worse,” she warned.

Federal assistance for Hurricane Helene had already exceeded $210mn, according to the White House, with almost $90mn of that bound for Florida.

A number of events have been cancelled as officials prepare for Milton’s arrival. Donald Trump’s presidential campaign postponed an event for Latino voters to be held in Miami on Tuesday because of the storm. “Our thoughts and prayers are with those in the path of Hurricane Milton,” the campaign said.

In an emergency briefing on Monday afternoon, Ken Graham, director of the National Weather Service, warned some parts of Florida could receive as much as 15 inches of rain.

He also warned the public that the area affected by the storm’s intense wind was expected to expand when it makes landfall.

“To everyone in the path of Milton, the time to prepare is right now,” said Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary.

Additional reporting by Steff Chávez in Washington