Hong Kong shares end 2.29 pct higher, tracking U.S. strengths

Friday, Oct 30,2009, 8:31:10 PM Click:

Gains in Wall Street led to a rebound in Hong Kong market, lifting the Hang Seng index by 2.29 percent to end the session on Friday.

Regains in U.S. economy gave strengths to its stock markets which finished up over 2 percent, sending Hong Kong shares to open higher.

Local benchmark index surged as much as 700 points during the morning session, reaching its day-high at 21,953.59. Gains narrowed down in the afternoon, the market earned 487.88 points to close at 21,752.87.

Turnover moved down to 76.35 billion HK dollars (about 9.86 billion U.S. dollars) from Thursday's 80.81 billion HK dollars ( about 10.44 billion U.S. dollars).

China Enterprises Index went up 302.69 points, or 2.43 percent, to close at 12,769.36 points.

All four major stock categories rose. The property sub-index became the biggest gainer, surging 4.95 percent. The finance sub- index gained 2.4 percent, the commerce and industry, 1.72 percent, and the utilities, 0.01 percent.

Cheung Kong, the flagship of Hong Kong's richest man Li Ka- shing, rose 3.19 percent to 100.3 HK dollars. Henderson Land surged 7.51 percent to 55.8 HK dollars. SHK Properties gained 6.4 percent to 119.7 HK dollars.

Blue-chips generally ended up. Banking giant HSBC Holdings rose 1.63 percent to close at 87.2 HK dollars. Heavyweight China Mobile, by far the largest mobile carrier in the mainland, edged up 0.27 percent to 74 HK dollars. HKEx, the sole exchange operator in Hong Kong, moved up 1.6 percent, to 139.8 HK dollars.

Mainland-based commercial lenders went up. Bank of China, rose 5.77 percent at 4.58 HK dollars. ICBC moved 3.45 percent up to 6. 29 HK dollars. CCB rose 3.03 percent down to 6.81 HK dollars.

Chinese insurance shares also gained. China Life edged up 0.83 percent to 36.55 HK dollars. Ping An rose 2.58 percent to 69.6 HK dollars.

As for energy shares, PetroChina edged up 0.52 percent to 9.6 HK dollars, off-shore oil producer CNOOC rose 4.52 percent to 12. 02 HK dollars, while Sinopec Corp gained 1.66 percent to 6.74 HK dollars. (7.8 HK dollars = 1 U.S. dollar)