ChiNext heavily traded on 1st day

A new Chinese stock exchange designed to nurture small and high-tech enterprises, has wrapped up its first day of trading in the southern city of Shenzhen. Friday saw shares of all companies listed on "ChiNext", or China's GEM Board, soar in price.

China's Nasdaq-style market went into operation with 28 listed companies Friday morning.

Stocks for all soared, as the 28 shares showed were highly traded.

The stocks surged by an average more than 76 percent, and kept rising until they were all temporarily suspended.

Among the listed companies, 10 saw their prices increase more than 100 percent.

Companies see ChiNext as a new channel to raise capital.

Song Liping, General Manager of Shenzhen Stock Exchange, said, "The launch of ChiNext further improves the multi-layer market mechanism for the Shenzhen Stock Exchange. For our country, it enables a large number of qualified companies to list in the domestic market."

More than 9.3 million investors opened accounts on ChiNext.

China says it hopes the new exchange will "channel resources into competitive emerging industries to nurture new economic growth."

The batch of 28 companies has an average price earning ratio of 56.7 -- which takes into account its share price compared to it's per share earning price. That figure is much higher than in the A-share market.

Only time will determine whether the P/E ratio is reasonable.

The industry regulator says ChiNext is not a copy of the small to medium enterprises plate, as most of its companies are from hi-tech sectors.