(Yicai) Jan. 29 -- China’s technological development will advance to the level of developed countries over the next decade, according to the overwhelming majority of Chinese investors who responded to a recent survey by the Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business.

Nearly 94 percent of respondents indicated that they expect China to match developed countries for tech development in the coming decade, the Cheung Kong Investor Sentiment Survey showed yesterday.

The CKISS is a quarterly poll by the Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business that gauges the sentiment, expectations, and risk appetite of Chinese investors toward domestic shares, Hong Kong stocks, and property prices. The fourth-quarter survey was done last month, with about 2,100 valid responses from around 1,300 retail investors and 800 financial industry practitioners.

China's economy is crossing the middle-income trap, Liu Jin, an accounting and finance professor and director of CKGSB's Investment Research Center, said at a conference to release the report. In this process, China needs to shift from an economic development model with relatively low tech content to a high-tech economy, Liu noted.

As a result, domestic investors’ confidence in China’s technological development is closely tied to their views on the country’s economic outlook, which in turn affects expectations for the Chinese stock market, Liu pointed out.

Nearly 80 percent of the surveyed investors acknowledged that artificial intelligence could bring about disruptive changes, Liu said, adding that is up from around 60 percent in the first survey of last year. About 60 percent said AI will not trigger massive job losses, highlighting Chinese investors' overall positive and rational attitude toward tech progress, Liu said.

Liu pointed out a distinctive feature of research, development, and innovation in China. The bulk of R&D spending is in the corporate sector, with corporate R&D outlays as a percentage of the total rising to 72 percent in 2015 to 2023 from 69 percent in 2005 to 2014, Liu noted.

Chinese entrepreneurs exercise strict R&D cost controls, Liu told Yicai. While this has kept China's R&D conversion efficiency at a high global level and made innovative products highly cost-effective, it has also led to relatively low investment in basic scientific research, potentially triggering “involution” in some industries, he said.

To truly break free from involution in innovation and for China's tech development to advance, companies need to show greater resolve and courage in conducting basic, large-scale, and breakthrough research, Liu noted.

The core reason why tech investment translates into corporate profits lies not in improved productivity, but in firms gaining the monopolistic advantage of intellectual property rights, Liu added.

Editor: Martin Kadiev