Hong Kong’s main stock index closes Year of the Monkey up 21pc

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index ended the Year of the Monkey up 21.11 per cent after a quiet last day of trading before the Lunar New Year.

Stocks opened lower, edging down in the first few minutes of trading on Friday, and ended the half-day session down 0.06 per cent at 23,360.78 points ahead of holidays to celebrate the Year of the Rooster.

The close represented an increase of about 4,000 points compared with February 6, 2016, the last day of trading for the Year of the Goat. The H-share index rose 21.73 per cent to 9,804.05 points on Friday.

“That’s not bad. We experienced a very volatile market [for the year], taking into account a lot of unexpected news,” said Louis Tse Ming-kwong, a director of VC Brokerage in Hong Kong.

Mainland Chinese markets were closed on Friday for a public holiday. The Shanghai Composite Index finished the Year of the Monkey up 14.3 per cent at 3,159.17 points when the market closed on Thursday. The Shenzhen Composite Index rose 9.5 per cent to 1,917.32 points for the year while the CSI 300 Index gained 14.3 per cent to 3,387.96 points.

“The outlook in the short term will be good. The [Hong Kong] stock market in the first quarter could hit the 24,000-point level,” Tse said.

“The market will be bolstered by the sentiment in US markets and anticipated positive earnings results from blue chips such as HSBC Holdings and Tencent Holdings.”