More Pain Predicted For Hong Kong Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The Hong Kong stock market has finished lower in consecutive trading days, slumping almost 450 points or 2 percent along the way. The Hang Seng Index now sits just above the 23,030-point plateau and it's looking at another soft start again on Wednesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is negative, with weakness expected from the technology and oil companies. The European and U.S. markets were mostly lower and the Asian bourses figure to follow that lead.

The Hang Seng finished sharply lower on Tuesday following losses from the financial shares, property stocks and technology companies, while the automobile producers were up.

For the day, the index plunged 307.59 points or 1.32 percent to finish at 23,034.02 after trading between 22,716.48 and 23,248.52.

Among the actives, Alibaba Group surrendered 3.76 percent, Alibaba Health Info plunged 4.36 percent, ANTA Sports skidded 1.50 percent, China Life Insurance stumbled 3.17 percent, China Mengniu Dairy shed 1.26 percent, China Resources Land rose 0.20 percent, CITIC slumped 1.85 percent, CNOOC eased 0.55 percent, CSPC Pharmaceutical dipped 0.59 percent, Galaxy Entertainment declined 2.11 percent, Haier Smart Home plummeted 4.08 percent, Hang Lung Properties slid 0.62 percent, Henderson Land fell 0.72 percent, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China lost 0.90 percent, JD.com tanked 3.79 percent, Lenovo dropped 1.39 percent, Li Auto skyrocketed 12.52 percent, Li Ning retreated 2.23 percent, Meituan cratered 4.74 percent, New World Development crashed 5.07 percent, Nongfu Spring tumbled 2.61 percent, Techtronic Industries added 0.28 percent, Xiaomi Corporation surged 3.10 percent, WuXi Biologics sank 1.27 percent and Hong Kong & China Gas was unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is mostly soft as the major averages opened mixed on Tuesday and finished in similar fashion.

The Dow gained 159.95 points or 0.37 percent to finish at 43,621.16, while the NASDAQ plummeted 260.54 points or 1.35 percent to close at 19,026.39 and the S&P 500 sank 28.00 points or 0.47 percent to end at 5,955.25.

Significant weakness among technology stocks weighed on Wall Street, as reflected the notable slump by the tech-heavy NASDAQ.

Traders continued to express concerns about the sustainability of the artificial intelligence trade ahead of the release of AI darling Nvidia's (NVDA) fourth quarter results on Wednesday.

The selling pressure also spurred concerns about the outlook for the economy after a Conference Board report showing a significant deterioration by U.S. consumer confidence in February.

Oil futures settled sharply lower on Tuesday as concerns about demand and oversupply in the market weighed and pushed the commodity's prices to the lowest level in about 11 weeks. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for April settled lower by $1.77 or at $68.93 a barrel.

Closer to home, Hong Kong will release Q4 data for gross domestic product later today, with forecasts suggesting an increase of 0.8 percent on quarter and 2.4 percent on year - steady from the previous quarter.