Hong Kong, Chinese shares down on November losses
01 Dec 2011
Hong Kong and Chinese shares were down with November drawing to a close yesterday, and comments by a Chinese central bank adviser dashed hopes of early monetary policy easing soon.
The Hang Seng Index was down 1.5 per cent at 17,689.4 on the day and lost 9.4 per cent for the month after surging around 13 per cent in October after falling 21.5 per cent in the third quarter.
Top Chinese banks and insurers figured as the major drags on the benchmark indices and the island's top bank, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, shed around 2 per cent in Hong Kong and 1 per cent in Shanghai.
Chinese central bank adviser Xia Bin said at an investment seminar in Beijing that the bank would "fine tune" its "prudent" monetary policy rather than effecting an outright shift. He added that curbs on the property market would be maintained.
He made the comments a day ahead of the scheduled release of Chinese manufacturing data for November, with investors edgy on indications from last week that industrial activity in Asia's largest economy had shrunk the most since early 2009.
Meanwhile, UBS and Citigroup have cut their growth forecasts for the world's second-largest economy, with analysts at Shenyin & Wanguo, a top Chinese brokerage, projected annual export growth to slow down to 7.7 per cent in November, roughly half of October's rate of growth.