Hong Kong stocks shed 1,372.03 points, or 8.17 percent, to close at 15,431.73 on Wednesday amid the worsening global financial turmoil, ignoring United States and British boost measures.
The benchmark Hang Seng Index tracked heavy overnight losses on Wall Street to open 4.14 percent lower at 16,107.98 and soon went below the 16,000 mark. It once pared losses in the afternoon to bounce back to the intra-day high of 16,422.52 but tumbled even more thereafter to close down 8.17 percent at 15,431.73.
It was the lowest for the blue chip index in over two years. The drop was one of the biggest losses for the blue-chip index in terms of either points or percentage points.
Turnover totaled 77.78 billion HK dollars (9.97 billion U.S. dollars), higher than Monday's 47.33 billion HK dollars (6.07 billion U.S. dollars) but just moderate.
All the 42 blue chip stocks lost ground, with market heavyweight HSBC Holdings shedding 4.7 HK dollars, or 3.9 percent, at 115.8 HK dollars, and its local unit Hang Seng Bank losing 4.6 HK dollars, or 3.90 percent, at 113.4 HK dollars.
China Mobile, another market heavyweights and by far the largest carrier on the mainland, lost 6.1 HK dollars, or 8.40 percent, to close at 66.5 HK dollars.
Analysts attributed the losses to heavy sell-off, with some saying that the market could respond later to the concerted boost measures by U.S. and European authorities, notably the British injection of 250 billion pounds into the banking system.
The Hong Kong Monetary Authority announced a surprise rate cut of 100 basis points before the opening of the market by adjusting the methodology for determining the discount window base rate, which went largely ignored by the stock market.
Local banker Stanley Wong said the rate cut will help alleviate the pressure on banks to raise lending rates, but he did not expect an immediate effect in the real property sector, as the banks did not face tight liquidity but were just not willing to risk lending to other institutions amid the current financial turmoil.
It was just a matter of confidence, he said.
Some analysts said the temporary bounce back of the Hang Seng Index could be explained by the announcement of British liquidity injection in the financial system.
The commerce and industry index suffered the most among the four major categories with a loss of 9.93 percent, followed by 8. 59 percent for the properties sector. The finance genre ended down6.95 percent and the utilities lost 6.15 percent.
Cheung Kong, the real estate conglomerate headed by "superman" Li Ka-shing, ended down 7.70 percent at 72.5 HK dollars. SHK Properties, one of the leading residential developers in Hong Kong, closed down 7.04 percent at 66 HK dollars.
ICBC, one of the largest state-owned commercial lenders on the mainland, lost 7.99 percent, at 3.8 HK dollars, and Bank of China lost 6.50 percent at 2.59 HK dollars. Ping An, the mainland-based insurance group, tumbled 12.94 percent at 40.05 HK dollars.
China Unicom plummeted 10.30 percent to 9.06 HK dollars on its first trading day after stock merger with the Hong Kong-listed mainland fixed line operator China Netcom.
The oil shares were among the biggest losers, with PetroChina tumbling 14.05 percent to close at 6.18 HK dollars and Sinopec down 12.5 percent at 4.9 HK dollars. CNOOC, the offshore oil producer, went down 14.25 percent to close at 6.5 HK dollars.
Shipping stock China COSCO shed 20.06 percent at 5.06 HK dollars. (7.8 HK dollars = 1 U.S. dollar)
Source: Xinhua
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