Hong Kong Shares Likely Rangebound On Monday

(RTTNews) - The Hong Kong stock market on Friday snapped the three-day winning streak in which it had accelerated almost 600 points or 3.6 percent. The Hang Seng Index now sits just above the 16,725-point plateau and it's likely to see little movement on Monday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is cautiously optimistic on optimism over earnings, although profit taking may take hold later in the day. The European and U.S. markets saw mostly modest gains and the Asian bourses figure to follow that lead.

The Hang Seng finished slightly lower on Friday following losses from the technology stocks and a mixed picture from the property sector.

For the day, the index fell 17.04 points or 0.10 percent to finish at 16,725.86 after trading between 16,654.68 and 16,895.82.

Among the actives, China Mengniu Dairy surged 4.27 percent, while ENN Energy soared 4.12 percent, Lenovo Group plummeted 3.28 percent, Meituan accelerated 2.19 percent, Li Ning Company spiked 1.95 percent, Galaxy Entertainment plunged 1.92 percent, New World Development tanked 1.81 percent, JD.com tumbled 1.68 percent, ANTA Sports jumped 1.60 percent, Haier Smart Home retreated 1.43 percent, Xiaomi Corporation declined 1.34 percent, Country Garden Services climbed 1.01 percent, WuXi Biologics slumped 0.98 percent, Industrial an Commercial Bank of China collected 0.98 percent, Hang Lung Properties dropped 0.92 percent, CSPC Pharmaceutical sank 0.78 percent, CITIC shed 0.61 percent, Alibaba Health Information and Nongfu Spring both lost 0.56 percent, CK Infrastructure advanced 0.54 percent, CNOOC gained 0.49 percent, Henderson Land fell 0.45 percent, Alibaba Group slid 0.40 percent, China Resources Land rose 0.19 percent, Hong Kong & China Gas was down 0.17 percent, Techtronic Industries eased 0.06 percent and China Life was unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is uninspired as the major averages opened solidly higher on Friday but faded as the day progressed, with the NASDAQ finishing in the red.

The Dow added 62.43 points or 0.16 percent to finish at 39,131.53, while the NASDAQ sank 44.78 points or 0.28 percent to close at 15,996.82 and the S&P 500 rose 1.77 points or 0.03 percent to end at 5,088.80.

For the holiday-shortened week, the S&P 500 surged 1.7 percent, the NASDAQ jumped 1.4 percent and the Dow advanced 1.3 percent.

The early upward move reflected an extension of the rally seen in during Thursday's session, which came on the heels of upbeat earnings news from AI darling Nvidia (NVDA).

Buying interest waned shortly after the start of trading, however, as traders took a breather following Thursday's surge.

Crude oil futures settled sharply lower on Friday as concerns about the outlook for demand and the recent data showing a jump in U.S. crude inventories weighed on prices. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for April dropped $2.12 or 2.65 percent at $76.49 a barrel.