Chinese shares briefly dipped into negative territory early in the session, but recovered and moved steadily higher from mid-morning, with the Shanghai Composite closing 3.7 per cent higher to 3,756.5 and the Shenzhen Composite rising 3.8 per cent to 2,151 as the country's two main stock exchanges and one of its biggest brokers pledged to limit short selling activity.

The gain brought to an end a three-day slide for the two Chinese benchmarks, with the best session for Shanghai stocks since a 4.5 per cent rise on July 10, and the best for Shenzhen stocks since a 5 per cent gain on July 17.

Meanwhile, the tech-focused ChiNext rebounded 6.1 per cent to 2,546.2, a day after it fell 5.5 per cent owing to new incoming rules about online payment processors.