bodyType

customContents

entityId

entityUuid

articlePageQuery

filter

article

articleBaseAdvertisingInfoArticle

articleListArticle

articleSeoArticle

hooksArticleAcknowledgementGateOverlayArticle

hooksTrackPageViewArticle

hooksContentInterestArticle

articleLinkingDataContent

hooksAmpRedirectArticle

articleSchemaContent

liveArticle

advertZone

sentiment

contentLock

topics

types

sections

paywallTypes

createdDate

publishedDate

urlAlias

moreOnThisArticles

sponsorType

commentCount

authorLocations

authors

corrections

displaySlideShow

multimediaEmbed

printHeadline

seriesContainer

articleSpeeches

socialHeadline

headline

images

flag

firstTopic

glossary

flattenTypeIds

image

relatedLinks

relatedNewsletters

__typename

sponsor

pdfFiles

seriesReverseOrder

series

disableOffPlatformContent

published

updatedDate

summary

subHeadline

body

keywords

readingTime

customTimezone

liveContents

SCMP Reporter

Stocks may gain this week as fund managers buy shares to plump up their figures before year-end book closings.

The prospect of another interest-rate cut of 25 basis points from the United States Federal Reserve will also aid sentiment. The reduction is expected to be mirrored by Hong Kong's banks.

'That should be positive for the property sector,' Phillip Securities research director Louis Wong Wai-kit said.

The Hang Seng Index closed at 11,279.25 points on Friday, down 0.38 per cent on the week.

Celestial Asia Securities research head Herbert Lau Chung-kwan said: 'I guess the market should be able to move up to retest 11,500 points.'

The market would also benefit from the end of the rebalancing of portfolios based on the Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) indices as changes making the benchmarks more sensitive to free floats were implemented on Friday.

Blue chips such as Hang Seng Bank, Hutchison and China Mobile might rise as selling pressure eased, Mr Lau said.

Asia Financial Securities vice-president said Ricky Tam Siu-hing said that there might be some downside, with fresh selling in Cheung Kong now that it had been reincluded in the MSCI benchmarks.

The market may retrace to support at 10,900 points on Friday's downward revision of third-quarter US economic growth. Hong Kong's economy shrank a less than expected 0.3 per cent.

Mr Tam said the full effects of the September 11 terrorist attacks had still to be felt and the Government was warning the fourth quarter would also be negative, fulfilling a recession's technical definition of two successive quarters of negative growth.

Most analysts dismissed fears that Argentina's debt crisis would upset sentiment among Hong Kong stock investors.

There is a land auction tomorrow but South China Securities institutional sales head Raymond Tsui Yick-ki said the two small sites were expected to fetch only HK$190 million together and were unlikely to move property counters.

Of more interest was the Shenzhen auction for a residential site which could yield one million square feet. Hong Kong developers were likely to bid, Mr Lau said.

A way to play it was to buy Shum Yip Investment, which has a substantial Shenzhen land bank.

'If there is a good [auction] result, [Shum Yip] should be a winner,' Mr Lau said.

Tung Tai Securities associate director Kenny Tang Sing-hing said Wheelock was worth looking at. It traded near a 60 per cent discount to net asset value of about $15 and last week's interim results were better than expected.

Mr Tsui said the relaxation of Growth Enterprise Market listing rules earlier this year meant there would be a flurry of listing this month.

Jonogden@scmp.com



Hopes for interest-rate cuts and portfolio buying leave players bullish