Hang Seng May Add To Its Winnings On Tuesday

(RTTNews) - The Hong Kong stock market has climbed higher in two straight sessions, rising almost 400 points or 1.6 percent along the way. The Hang Seng Index now sits just beneath the 25,400-point plateau and it's expected to see additional support on Tuesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets suggests mild upside on support from the technology shares. The European markets were down and the U.S. bourses were up and the Asian markets figure to follow the latter lead.

The Hang Seng finished modestly higher on Monday following gains from the financial shares and mixed performances from the technology and property stocks.

For the day, the index jumped 215.79 points or 0.86 percent to finish at 25,398.18 after trading between 25,174.30 and 25,486.76.

Among the actives, AIA lost 0.30 percent, while Alibaba Group rallied 1.57 percent, Baidu sank 0.69 percent, Bank of China gained 0.19 percent, BOC Hong Kong advanced 0.67 percent, China Construction Bank collected 0.47 percent, China Life Insurance was up 0.07 percent, China Merchants Bank improved 0.64 percent, China Petroleum & Chemical expanded 0.93 percent, China Shenhua Energy soared 4.79 percent, CITIC stumbled 1.52 percent, CNOOC vaulted 1.14 percent, Hong Kong Exchange perked 0.10 percent, HSBC climbed 0.83 percent, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China gathered 0.15 percent, JD.com dropped 0.97 percent, Lenovo surged 5.17 percent, Meituan skyrocketed 6.54 percent, NetEase increased 0.57 percent, Nongfu Spring jumped 1.78 percent, PetroChina rose 0.18 percent, Ping An Insurance added 0.25 percent, Semiconductor Manufacturing plunged 2.63 percent, Sun Hung Kai Properties retreated 1.29 percent, Tencent Holdings accelerated 2.06 percent, Xiaomi Corporation spiked 2.43 percent, WuXi AppTec tumbled 1.61 percent, Zijin Mining eased 0.06 percent and China Mobile was unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is positive as the major averages opened under water on Monday but quickly started to trend higher, finally ending at fresh record closing highs.

The Dow added 46.42 points or 0.09 percent to finish at 51,078.88. while the NASDAQ climbed 114.19 points or 0.42 percent to end at 27,086.81 and the S&P 500 rose 19.90 points or 0.26 percent to close at 7,599.96.

The higher close on Wall Street partly reflected strength among tech stocks after Nvidia (NVDA) unveiled a new superchip RTX Spark in collaboration with Microsoft (MSFT) that the company said reinvents Windows PCs for the era of personal AI agents.

Buying interest was somewhat subdued, however, as the price of crude oil surged in reaction to the latest developments regarding the conflict in the Middle East.

Crude oil prices skyrocketed Monday on reports the U.S. and Iran exchanging attacks while the U.S. is yet to endorse a negotiated settlement to end the war. West Texas Intermediate crude for July delivery was up $4.64 or 5.31 percent at $92.00 per barrel.

However, crude oil prices pulled back off their highs after President Donald Trump said talks with Iran are continuing at a "rapid pace," while positive communications with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hezbollah also spurred hopes for an end to the war.

Closer to home, Hong Kong will provide April figures for retail sales later today; in March, sales were up 12.8 percent on year.