No Help Yet For Hong Kong Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The Hong Kong stock market has finished lower in three straight sessions, plunging more than 840 points or 3.8 percent along the way. The Hang Seng Index now sits just above the 21,220-point plateau and it's expected to open under pressure again on Tuesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is soft on renewed concerns over the outlook for interest rates. The European and U.S. markets were down and the Asian bourses are expected to open in similar fashion.

The Hang Seng finished sharply lower on Monday with damage across the board, especially among the technology, resource and property stocks.

For the day, the index plummeted 438.31 points or 2.02 percent to finish at 21,222.16 after trading between 21,085.72 and 21,349.17.

Among the actives, Alibaba Group declined 2.73 percent, while Alibaba Health Info plummeted 7.18 percent, ANTA Sports tumbled 3.17 percent, China Life Insurance slumped 2.18 percent, China Mengniu Dairy surrendered 3.38 percent, China Resources Land skidded 2.04 percent, CITIC shed 1.10 percent, CNOOC fell 0.89 percent, Country Garden plunged 6.13 percent, CSPC Pharmaceutical tanked 3.93 percent, Galaxy Entertainment lost 1.00 percent, Hang Lung Properties retreated 2.62 percent, Henderson Land dropped 1.37 percent, Hong Kong & China Gas dipped 0.39 percent, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China slumped 1.72 percent, JD.com declined 3.55 percent, Lenovo sank 1.25 percent, Li Ning tanked 4.36 percent, Meituan plummeted 5.03 percent, New World Development skidded 1.67 percent, Techtronic Industries tumbled 3.84 percent, Xiaomi Corporation plunged 4.90 percent and WuXi Biologics surrendered 3.71 percent.

The lead from Wall Street is negative as the major averages opened lower on Monday and remained in the red throughout the session.

The Dow shed 34.99 points or 0.10 percent to finish at 33,891.02, while the NASDAQ tumbled 119.50 points or 1.00 percent to end at 11,887.45 and the S&P 500 sank 25.40 points or 0.61 percent to close at 4,111.08.

Concerns about the outlook for interest rates continued to weigh on Wall Street following last week's stronger than expected jobs data, which could prompt the Federal Reserve to speed up its pace for interest rate hikes.

Computer hardware stocks were under pressure, as were steel, housing, semiconductor and gold shares.

Oil prices climbed higher Monday on optimism energy demand from China will see a big jump after Saudi Arabia unexpectedly increased the prices of oil to be shipped to Asia. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for March ended higher by $0.72 or 1 percent at $74.11 a barrel.