Two major state-owned enterprises stopped trading on Monday, fueling speculation over a potential merger between the two.

China Shenhua Energy Company Limited, the largest coal supplier and vendor in China, halted its trading on Monday.

The company later issued a statement, saying the halt was due to its dominant stakeholder, Shenhua Group Corp.'s possible plans to make major changes to China Shenhua.

The statement added that there might be major unstable elements in the company's future strategy.

Guodian Power Development Co., Ltd. also issued a similar note, saying its major shareholder China Guodian Corporation, one of China's largest coal-fired generators, is also planning major changes.

"To protect investors' benefit and avoid unusual fluctuations of the company's prices, Guodian Power Development has decided to halt trading from June 5, 2017," read the statement.

15 pairs of central state-owned enterprises have experienced mergers since 2012, according to Chinese financial news media Caixin.

Before the potential merger, China has 102 central state-owned enterprises, according to the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission (SASAC).

Caixin says that according to a SASAC meeting, this year's number of central state-owned enterprises will be reduced to under 100.

Reports have predicted the possibility of a potential merger between Shenhua and Guodian. "The statements between the two companies do not show certain connectivity, but the fact the two companies made big announcements on the same day, and the two are also on the upstream and downstream of the same industry chain indicate the possibility of a merger," said Caixin.

On June 2, a meeting held by SASAC said that mergers of central state-owned enterprises in the coal and electricity sector are one of the focuses of SOE reform this year.

In a government work report delivered by Premier Li Keqiang in March, China pledged to deepen SOE reform in 2017, promising measures such as introducing a mixed-ownership system and more efforts to make SOEs leaner, healthier, and perform better.

China Shenhua Energy Company's share price rose 2.62 percent to 22.29 yuan (3.3 US dollars) on Friday. Guodian Power Development rose 4.65 percent to 3.60 yuan on Friday (0.53 US dollars).

Email: tanyuhan@nbd.com.cn