Investors may target housing and consumption

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Investors may be willing to spend more on daily consumption and property purchases this year as they continue to be cautious toward the stock market, which caused them to suffer losses in 2011, according to a survey.

Up to 49 percent of residents in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou suffered huge losses when the Shanghai stock market lost 20 percent of its value last year, the Canton Public Opinion Research Center said in its survey recently. Half of the respondents were uncertain over the market outlook despite the central government's call for investors to have confidence.

Investors in Shanghai were more dissatisfied than their peers in other cities about the tumble in share prices, according to the survey which covered 2,000 respondents nationwide. Up to 42 percent disagreed with the recent call to be confident in the market, against 31 percent who backed it and 27 percent who stayed neutral.

Though nearly 56 percent saw higher consumer prices this year, 45 percent would spend more on consumption. Ten percent may buy property as 47 percent agreed with experts that housing prices will hit a tipping point and then decline.