Locked-up shares of $2.95b for trading

China's stock market will see 18.31 billion yuan (US$2.95 billion) in locked-up shares become eligible for trading this week, according to data from bourses.

The figure was sharply down from the 40.9 billion yuan in shares that became tradable last week, data from the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges showed.

A total of 1.83 billion non-tradable shares of 19 listed companies will be released after their lock-up periods expire this week, the data showed.

Under market rules, major shareholders of non-tradable stocks are subject to one or two years of lock-up before they are permitted to trade the shares.

Gansu Yasheng Industrial (Group) Co, an agricultural company based in northwest China, will see non-tradable shares worth 1.36 billion yuan become tradable on Friday, the largest amount to become tradable on the Shanghai Stock Exchange this week.