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Hong Kong stocks end 0.23% down

Hong Kong stocks fell 49.22 points, or 0.23 percent, to end at 21,823.28 on Monday, the first trading day of 2010.

A woman passes by a board displaying the Hang Seng Index of the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in Hong Kong, south China, Jan. 4, 2010. Hong Kong stocks fell 49.22 points, or 0.23 percent, to end at 21,823.28 points on Monday. (Xinhua/Song Zhenping)
The benchmark index opened 0.06 percent lower at 21,860.04 after the public holiday on Friday. The stocks traded between 22, 024.83 and 21,689.22 before closing.
Turnover rose to 48.51 billion HK dollars (6.26 billion U.S. dollars) from Thursday’s 30.05 billion HK dollars (about 3.88 billion U.S. dollars).
Chinese financial companies led the decline of Hong Kong stocks, tracking the fall of Shanghai index over the timing of Beijing’s withdrawal of stimulus measures.
Traders expected that Hong Kong stocks to trade between 21,000 to 22,000 in the new year due to the investors adjustments’ on their portfolios.
China Enterprises Index went down 43.58 points, or 0.34 percent, to close at 12,750.55 points.
The four major stock categories ended mixed. The finance sub- index and commerce and industry sub-index dropped 0.5 percent and 0.03 percent respectively. The utilities moved up 0.56 percent, the properties rose 0.16 percent.
Blue-chips closed lower. Banking giant HSBC Holdings slightly fell 0.17 percent at 89.25 HK dollars. Heavyweight China Mobile, by far the largest mobile carrier in China’s mainland, almost fell0.69 percent to 72.35 HK dollars. HKEx, the sole exchange operator in Hong Kong, lost 0.72 percent to 138.4 HK dollars.
Local properties ended mixed. Cheung Kong, the flagship of HongKong’s richest man Li Ka-shing, fell 0.3 percent to 100 HK dollars. Henderson Land finished 0.34 percent higher at 58.6 HK dollars. SHK Properties moved down 1.17 percent to 116.1 HK dollars.
Mainland-based commercial lenders dived. CCB fell 1.2 percent to 6.59 HK dollars. ICBC fell 1 percent to 6.37 HK dollars.
Chinese insurance companies also ended down. China Life fell 0.7 percent to 38.1 HK dollars. Ping An moved down 0.7 percent to 67. 5 HK dollars.
As for energy shares, PetroChina fell 0.32 percent to 9.29 HK dollars, off-shore oil producer CNOOC rose 0.33 percent to 12.24 HK dollars, Sinopec Corp moved down 2.6 percent to 6.73 HK dollars. (7.8 HK dollars = 1 U.S. dollar)