China's National Equities Exchange and Quotations (NEEQ), also known as the "new third board," saw the debut of 8 new small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) this week.

Including the newcomers, the total number of companies on the board now stands at 10,854, according to the exchange.

Weekly turnover stands at 1.05 billion yuan (about 151 million U.S. dollars), down 8.79 percent compared with a week earlier.

The indexes of NEEQ were still weak. The NEEQ Component Index closed at 956.62 points while the NEEQ Market Making Component Index stood at 714.43 points on Friday.

More than 1,200 NEEQ-listed companies have issued shares of 52.9 billion yuan since the beginning of 2018, according to the NEEQ.

Founded in 2013, the NEEQ was launched to supplement the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges and is seen as a more beneficial financing channel for small businesses, with low costs and simple listing procedures.

By day's end on Nov. 8, 2018, the market value of NEEQ totaled about 3.54 trillion yuan.

China has worked to build a multi-level capital market that satisfies growing funding demand from all kinds of companies, no matter how big or small, with measures taken to reform the stock market and encourage direct financing.