HK stocks close lower on global growth worries; Tencent shares falter


Devdiscourse News Desk | Updated: 22-01-2019 16:40 IST | Created: 22-01-2019 14:15 IST
HK stocks close lower on global growth worries; Tencent shares falter
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Hong Kong stocks closed lower on Tuesday after the global economic outlook grew murky, fresh tensions emerged between the United States and China, while shares of market leader Tencent faltered. The benchmark Hang Seng index ended down 0.7 per cent at 27,005.45 points. The Hang Seng China Enterprises index fell 0.9 percent. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) trimmed its global growth forecasts and a survey showed increasing pessimism among business chiefs as trade tensions and uncertainty loomed on Monday, ahead of the World Economic Forum in Davos. The IMF's warning came shortly after China reported its slowest growth in 28 years for 2018, amid the trade war with the United States and cooling domestic demand.

U.S. President Donald Trump attributed China's economic slowdown to U.S. trade policies in a tweet https://bit.ly/2CCBsGM on Monday, and said it "makes so much sense for China to finally do a Real Deal, and stop playing around!" The two sides agreed to a 90-day truce in the trade war at the start of last December. In a move certain to ratchet up tensions with China, the U.S. will proceed with the formal extradition from Canada of Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou, Canada's ambassador to the U.S. told the Globe and Mail on Tuesday. China responded on Tuesday afternoon, saying that the U.S. and Canada have abused their extradition agreement in this case. Tencent Holdings Ltd, the most actively-traded name in Hong Kong's stock market, missed out on a third batch of video games approvals in China after a long freeze on such approvals for much of last year. The company's stock edged down 1.2 percent.

With Tencent in trouble, and as U.S.-China relations may sour again, the information technology sub-index lost 1.5 percent and shares of I.T. hardware makers dropped 1.1 percent. Hang Seng's sub-index tracking energy shares dipped 1.8 percent, the financial sector ended 0.4 percent lower and the property sector dipped 0.2 percent. The top gainer on the Hang Seng was Link Real Estate Investment Trust, which gained 1.8 percent, while the biggest loser was AAC Technologies Holdings Inc, which fell 5.1 percent. China's main Shanghai Composite index closed down 1.2 percent at 2,579.70 points, while the blue-chip CSI300 index ended down 1.3 percent. Around the region, MSCI's Asia ex-Japan stock index was weaker by 0.7 percent, while Japan's Nikkei index closed down 0.5 percent.

The three biggest H-shares percentage decliners were CSPC Pharmaceutical Group Ltd, which was down 3.7 percent, PetroChina Co Ltd, which fell 3.3 percent and China Shenhua Energy Co Ltd, down by 2.9 percent. At close, China's A-shares were trading at a premium of 16.78 percent over the Hong Kong-listed H-shares.  The short and one-factor leveraged Hang Seng index, which is designed to replicate the payoff of a short or leveraged portfolio and is linked to the movements of the Hang Seng Index, was higher by 0.7 percent on the day at 5,118.88 points. 

(With inputs from agencies.)

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