The Hong Kong stock market has finished lower in three straight sessions, sliding almost 150 points or 0.6 percent along the way. The Hang Seng Index now rests just above the 26,150-point plateau although it's due to find support on Monday.
The global forecast for the Asian markets is upbeat on earnings news and hopes for a coronavirus vaccine. The European markets were mixed and the U.S. bourses were up and the Asian markets figure to follow the latter lead.
The Hang Seng finished barely lower on Friday following losses from the properties and oil and insurance companies.
For the day, the index fell 12.52 points or 0.05 percent to finish at the daily high of 26,156.86 after moving as low as 25,909.18.
Among the actives, WuXi Biologics surge 5.70 percent, while China Mobile plummeted 5.03 percent, Xiaomi Corporation soared 4.30 percent, CNOOC plunged 4.04 percent, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China tanked 2.92 percent, China Life Insurance tumbled 2.89 percent, BOC Hong Kong skidded 2.64 percent, CITIC retreated 2.37 percent, WH Group spiked 2.29 percent, China Petroleum and Chemical (Sinopec) declined 2.22 percent, China Resources Land surrendered 2.02 percent, AAC Technologies jumped 1.93 percent, Alibaba climbed 1.58 percent, CSPC Pharmaceutical gathered 1.34 percent, AIA Group perked 1.25 percent, Techtronic Industries advanced 0.99 percent, Galaxy Entertainment sank 0.92 percent, Sun Hing Kai Properties dropped 0.76 percent, Henderson Land shed 0.65 percent, Ping An Insurance lost 0.64 percent, Sands China added 0.61 percent, Hong Kong & China Gas fell 0.50 percent, New World Development slid 0.25 percent, China Mengniu Dairy was up 0.24 percent and Power Assets Holdings was unchanged.
The lead from Wall Street is positive as stocks opened higher on Friday and picked up steam as the day progressed, reversing losses from the previous session.
The Dow soared 399.61 points or 1.37 percent to finish at 29,479.81, while the NASDAQ jumped 119.69 points or 1.02 percent to end at 11,829.29 and the S&P 500 climbed 48.14 points or 1.36 percent to close at 3,58515. For the week, the Dow jumped 4.1 percent, the NASDAQ fell 0.6 percent and the S&P climbed 2.2 percent.
The rebound on Wall Street partly reflected a positive reaction to earnings news from companies like Cisco (CSCO), Disney (DIS) and DraftKings (DKNG), which all beat forecasts.
The markets also seemed to benefit from news that President Donald Trump's campaign continues to face setbacks in efforts to overturn the results of the presidential election, eliminating some of the lingering uncertainty about the outcome.
Traders also continue to express optimism about a potential coronavirus vaccine even as new cases in the U.S. spiked to another new record high.
Crude oil futures settled sharply lower on Friday, weighed down by concerns over excess supply and a weak outlook for energy demand due to rising coronavirus cases. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for December ended down $0.99 or 2.4 percent at $40.13 a barrel. But for the week, WTI crude oil futures gained 8 percent.
For comments and feedback contact: editorial@rttnews.com
