Renewed Consolidation Likely For Hang Seng

(RTTNews) - The Hong Kong stock market on Tuesday snapped the two-day losing streak in which it had slumped more than 700 points or 3 percent. The Hang Seng Index now rests just beneath the 25,800 point plateau although it may hand back those gains on Wednesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is weak on continued concerns over the conflict in the Middle East and on the outlook got interest rates. The European markets were mixed and the U.S. bourses were down and the Asian markets figure to follow the latter lead.

The Hang Seng finished modestly higher on Tuesday as gains from the financial shares and oil companies were capped by weakness from the insurance stocks and a mixed picture from the technology shares.

For the day, the index gained 122.67 points or 0.48 percent to finish at 25,797.85 after trading between 25,671.12 and 25,845.46

Among the actives, AIA slumped 0.81 percent, while Alibaba Group vaulted 1.21 percent, Baidu strengthened 1.48 percent, Bank of China advanced 1.15 percent, BOC Hong Kong spiked 1.82 percent, China Construction Bank collected 1.03 percent, China Life Insurance and JD.com both lost 0.47 percent, China Merchants Bank and China Hongqiao both shed 0.52 percent, China Mobile increased 0.46 percent, China Petroleum & Chemical rose 0.22 percent, China Shenhua Energy fell 0.36 percent, CITIC gained 0.38 percent, CNOOC surged 2.99 percent, HSBC jumped 1.59 percent, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China climbed 1.17 percent, Meituan improved 1.10 percent, NetEase rallied 1.77 percent, Nongfu Spring added 0.42 percent, PetroChina expanded 1.18 percent, Ping An Insurance dropped 0.73 percent, Semiconductor Manufacturing dipped 0.29 percent, Sun Hung Kai Properties sank 0.59 percent, Tencent Holdings soared 2.40 percent, Xiaomi Corporation eased 0.07 percent, WuXi AppTec added 0.24 percent, Zijin Mining tumbled 2.96 percent and Hong Kong Exchange was unchanged.

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

The Dow slumped 322.24 points or 0.65 percent to finish at 49,363.88, while the NASDAQ tumbled 220.03 points or 0.84 percent to close at 25,870.71 and the S&P 500 sank 49.44 points or 0.67 percent to end at 7,353.61.

The weakness on Wall Street came amid an extended surge by treasury yields, with the yield on the benchmark ten-year note jumping to its highest levels since January 2025.

Concerns about elevated crude oil prices leading to a sustained acceleration in the pace of inflation continued to drive yields higher and increase the possibility of an interest rate hike.

Crude oil prices took a breather on Tuesday following news the U.S. is halting its planned attacks on Iran, although the Strait of Hormuz remains closed. West Texas Intermediate crude for June was down $0.07 or 0.1 percent at $108.59 per barrel.