Hi David - the China A shares and H shares are not as cheap as the index PEs suggest. The H share index in particular is dominated by banks and oil companies - which deserve to have low PEs. Many, perhaps even most, of the A share companies remain expensive and over valued. The Hang Seng by contrast is far cheaper - comparable companies trade at big discounts to those listed in China - and a number of these would make good investments right now.

David Fuller's view

Thanks for making this point.  Here are the top 22 companies by weighting for HSI and HSCEI.  Both are cheap but HSI is far more diversified, as you point out, while HSCEI is dominated mainly by banks and insurance companies, plus two oil companies in the list provided.  The relative PEs are, HSI 9.34, HSCEI 7.01, and Shanghai A-Shares 15.81, according to Bloomberg.