BEIJING - A Chinese bank has dozens of shareholders below the age of 18, including a 10-year-old, which has drawn questions and criticism from financial experts and Internet users, Chinese media reported on Wednesday.

Bank of Beijing , which began trading on the Shanghai Stock Exchange last month, said the 84 investors were legal shareholders, who had maintained the shares through the bank's restructuring in 1996 and capital increase in 2004, the semi-official China News Centre said, citing a Beijing newspaper.

Among them, 35 people each owned more than 100,000 shares, and one was as young as 10.

The child became a shareholder when he was one and now is the bank's 13th-largest shareholder, with some 1.3 million shares in the bank, a Xi'an newspaper reported.

Legal and financial experts said it was abnormal for a listed company to have so many under-aged shareholders, and the bank should disclose information about their guardians.

It was not clear whether some of the guardians might be trying to take advantage of financial or tax benefits by shifting some family assets to the young shareholders' accounts.

'These young people cannot tell the risks of the market, and it is risky behaviour for themselves and also for investors,' the China News Centre quoted legal and economic expert Liu Jipeng as saying.

More and more ordinary Chinese have been sinking their savings into stocks, eager to cash in on the market's boom and in the absence of other investment choices.

Policymakers, however, fear an impact not only on the economy but on social stability if the bubble bursts.

'The bank noticed the situation when doing checks of shareholders, but under the relevant laws, regulations and other directives, there is no ban or restriction on people below the age of 18 holding shares,' Bank of Beijingwas quoted as saying.

'Therefore, there is no need for special dealings with the shares,' it added. - REUTERS