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Hang Seng Index briefly slips below 23,000 as Alibaba slumps to 16-month low

Alibaba led Hong Kong tech stocks lower, pushing the Hang Seng briefly below 23,000 as AI and consumer worries hit sentiment

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The city’s benchmark stock index briefly dipped below 23,000 as technology shares came under pressure. Photo: Jelly Tse
Zhang Shidongin Shanghai
A sell-off in Chinese technology stocks drove Hong Kong’s benchmark index briefly below the 23,000-point mark for the first time in a year, as Alibaba Group Holding slumped to a 16-month low after US artificial intelligence firm Anthropic PBC accused it of “illicitly” extracting capabilities from its Claude model.

The Hang Seng Index shed 1.4 per cent to 23,076.91 at market close on Thursday, paring a decline of as much as 1.9 per cent that dragged the benchmark down to an intraday low of 22,978.59. The Hang Seng Tech Index sank 1.6 per cent.

On the mainland, the CSI 300 Index closed 1.6 per cent higher and a gauge of the technology-dominated Star Market surged almost 4 per cent to a record.

Alibaba slumped 4.4 per cent to HK$95, finishing at its lowest price since February 2, 2025, with the episode throwing into doubt Chinese technology companies’ ability to compete with US peers in the AI frontier. Even a blowout business forecast from memory-chip giant Micron Technology failed to allay the turbulence.

That added to worsening sentiment on Hong Kong stocks over the past weeks, as the US Federal Reserve shifted to a more hawkish tone under new chair Kevin Warsh and turmoil in South Korean chip stocks heightened global concerns about the valuations of AI firms. Higher borrowing costs in the US tend to reduce the appeal of stocks in Asia and squelch equity valuations by spurring outflows from the region.

“The volatile environments overseas have an obvious hindrance to Hong Kong stocks,” said Chen Meng, an analyst at Soochow Securities. “While Hong Kong’s technology stocks look attractive in valuations, there are no fresh inflows of capital for now. New catalysts require fundamentals or policies that exceed expectations.”

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