Soft Start Expected For Hong Kong Stock Market

(RTTNews) - Ahead of Monday's holiday for National Day, the Hong Kong stock market had moved higher in two of three trading days since the end of the two-day slide in which it had dropped more than 600 points or 3.4 percent. The Hang Seng Index now sits just above the 17,800-point plateau although it may hand back some of those gains on Tuesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is mixed and flat ahead of key employment data later this week. The European markets were down and the U.S. bourses were mixed and the Asian markets figure to split the difference.

The Hang Seng finished sharply higher on Friday with gains across the board, particularly among the property and technology sectors.

For the day, the index surged 436.66 points or 2.51 percent to finish at 17,809.66 after trading between 17,482.39 and 17,935.15.

Among the actives, Alibaba Group gathered 3.13 percent, while Alibaba Health Info skyrocketed 10.66 percent, ANTA Sports rallied 5.25 percent, China Life Insurance collected 2.01 percent, China Mengniu Dairy surged 6.06 percent, China Resources Land added 3.31 percent, CITIC perked 2.86 percent, CNOOC eased 0.14 percent, Country Garden rose 3.19 percent, CSPC Pharmaceutical gained 0.88 percent, Galaxy Entertainment climbed 4.20 percent, Hang Lung Properties spiked 5.51 percent, Henderson Land strengthened 4.29 percent, Hong Kong & China Gas was up 2.44 percent, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China collected 1.89 percent, JD.com improved 3.60 percent, Lenovo gained 3.20 percent, Li Ning jumped 4.77 percent, Meituan increased 3.43 percent, New World Development soared 5.54 percent, Techtronic Industries added 1.81 percent, Xiaomi Corporation accelerated 5.29 percent and WuXi Biologics advanced 3.51 percent.

The lead from Wall Street offers little clarity as the major averages opened mixed on Monday and finished the same way, little changed.

The Dow shed 74.15 points or 0.22 percent to finish at 33,433.35, while the NASDAQ jumped 88.45 points or 0.67 percent to close at 13,307.77 and the S&P 500 perked 0.34 points or 0.01 percent to end at 4,288.39.

Concerns about the outlook for interest rates continued to hang over the markets ahead of the release of the Labor Department's closely watched monthly jobs report on Friday.

Negative sentiment was also generated in reaction to a surge by treasury yields, with the yield on the benchmark 10-year note jumping to its highest level in almost sixteen years.

In economic news, the Institute for Supply Management noted a modest slowdown in the pace of contraction in U.S. manufacturing activity in September. Also, the Commerce Department said construction spending in the U.S. increased in line with estimates in August.

Crude oil prices fell sharply on Monday, hurt by a stronger dollar and concerns about prospects of rising supplies in the market. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for November sank $1.97 or 2.2 percent at $88.82 a barrel.