Persistently high listing costs in Hong Kong have discourage many enterprises, especially those from the Chinese mainland, from floating there.[Photo/IC]

BEIJING -- Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited (HKEx) said Wednesday that it has not yet reached any agreement on the establishment of the Shenzhen-HK Stock Connect.

The announcement came after central bank governor Zhou Xiaochuan said in an article published Tuesday that China will launch such a program within the year, which substantially propped up stocks both on the mainland and in Hong Kong.

"As of the date of this announcement, the proposed Shenzhen-HK Stock Connect is still subject to regulatory approval and no agreement with our counterparts has been entered into," said HKEx.

HKEx has been in discussions with its counterparts on the Chinese mainland regarding establishment of the program, which is designed to allow overseas investors to trade mainland shares under a quota.

China set up the Shanghai-HK Stock Connect last year, and it is also mulling a similar program to link Shanghai with the London Stock Exchange.

The launch of the Shenzhen-HK Stock Connect, together with the earlier Shanghai-HK Stock Connect, showed that "the mainland capital market has been opening up to the outside world," Zhou said in the article published on the central bank's website.

On the news, the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index rose 2.6 percent in the morning session Wednesday, and Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index surged 3.1 percent.

The central bank said at midday Wednesday that Zhou's article was a speech delivered to central bank officials on May 27, before the stock market rout that began in mid-June, which many analysts believed would delay the launch of the Shenzhen-HK Stock Connect.

Mainland shares continued to rise in the afternoon session, while Hong Kong shares started to dip.