Renewed Support Predicted For Hong Kong Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The Hong Kong stock market headed south again on Friday, one session after ending the two-day slide in which it had stumbled more than 410 points or 2 percent. The Hang Seng Index now sits just above the 20,075-point plateau although it figures to bounce higher again on Monday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets suggests mild upside ahead of economic and earnings news coming the week. The European and U.S. markets were slightly higher on Friday and the Asian bourses figure to follow suit.

The Hang Seng finished sharply lower on Friday with damage across the board, especially from the technology, property and energy sectors.

For the day, the index stumbled 321.27 points or 1.58 percent to finish at 20,075.73 after trading between 19,974.91 and 20,378.90.

Among the actives, Alibaba Group tanked 4.14 percent, while Alibaba Health Info plunged 4.36 percent, ANTA Sports was down 0.15 percent, China Life Insurance stumbled 1.66 percent, China Mengniu Dairy and Nongfu Spring both sank 0.94 percent, China Resources Land slipped 0.66 percent, CITIC rose 0.10 percent, CNOOC lost 0.80 percent, Country Garden plummeted 4.61 percent, CSPC Pharmaceutical eased 0.13 percent, Galaxy Entertainment skidded 1.11 percent, Hang Lung Properties slid 0.69 percent, Henderson Land fell 0.76 percent, Hong Kong & China Gas dipped 0.44 percent, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China shed 0.93 percent, JD.com retreated2.24 percent, Lenovo declined 2.39 percent, Li Ning rallied 2.87 percent, Meituan weakened 1.92 percent, New World Development dropped 0.98 percent, Techtronic Industries slumped 1.31 percent, Xiaomi Corporation surrendered 3.51 percent and WuXi Biologics tumbled 3.45 percent.

The lead from Wall Street is cautiously optimistic as the major averages bounced back and forth across the unchanged line on Friday before finally finishing barely higher.

The Dow added 22.36 points or 0.07 percent to finish at 33,808.96, while the NASDAQ perked 12.86 points or 0.11 percent to close at 12,072.46 and the S&P 500 rose 3.73 points or 0.09 percent to end at 4,133.52.

For the week, the S&P 500 eased 0.1 percent, the Dow slipped 0.2 percent and the NASDAQ dipped by 0.4 percent.

The choppy trading on Wall Street came as traders seemed reluctant to make significant moves ahead of several key economic reports and corporate earnings numbers due be released this week.

Crude oil prices climbed higher Friday, buoyed by fairly strong data on private sector activity in the U.K. and eurozone. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for June ended higher by $0.50 or 0.7 percent at $77.87 a barrel. WTI lost 5.5 percent last week.