Chinese stocks declined at the close of Thursday session for the third day in a row, as investors were cautious on the eve of the New Year on the lunar calendar, and the shares of small-cap companies have updated the 10 year lows.
CSI300 Index, which tracks the value of securities of the largest companies traded in Shanghai and Shenzhen, fell 0.5% to 3,317.62 points. The composite index of the Shanghai Stock Exchange – Shanghai Composite, lost 0.6% and closed the session at the level of 3,119.29 points.
The investors’ activity is usually reduced in anticipation of the celebration of the Chinese Lunar New Year, taking into account the risk of lack of liquidity in the financial system.
Government officials say that at the beginning of this year, China's economy as a whole has maintained a stable trend, which started in the second half of 2016, but at the same time warned of the possible difficulties in the development of trade in 2017.
ChiNext Index, reflecting the dynamics of the value of technology stocks and internet start-ups fell 0.4%, which is a negative result for the sixth session in a row.
Virtually all major sectors lost ground after commodity stocks and industrial sectors.
Stock indexes in Hong Kong today also went into negative - investors took a pause after five days of growth.
Hong Kong Stock Exchange index – Hang Seng dropped 0.5% to 22,829.02 points. The index of Chinese companies traded in Hong Kong, lost 0.1%, closing at 9,723.05 points.
Market participants took profits after the stocks have increased for the past five days, in which the key index rose more than 3.6%.
Shares of companies engaged in the services sector were the leaders of the fall - the corresponding index lost 1.4%.
The tech sector also sagged amid falling shares of Tencent Holdings Ltd by more than 1% after rising 6.2% in the past five sessions.