For 10 years a yawning chasm has existed between the performance China’s stock market and its economy, according to a veteran China expert, who likens the market to a casino – with all the risk that that entails for foreign investors.

Jonathan Anderson, a former resident representative at the International Monetary Fund for China and Russia and now an independent analyst, said the main reason for investors’ dissatisfaction with China’s stock market was the high valuation of Chinese equities when they listed.