Chinese ADRs and ETFs jumped in premarket trading. KE Holdings rose 5.4%; YINN rose 4.3%; Tencent Music rose 3.7%; Bilibili, Nio rose 1.4%; PDD Holdings rose 1%.
Hong Kong will loosen mortgage rules and cut an alcohol tax in a series of measures seeking to support the flagging real estate sector and boost spending, as China’s slowdown weighs on the city’s economy.
Chief Executive John Lee said he will raise the amount of loans homebuyers are allowed to borrow for some properties and broaden a residency-by-investment program. The city’s leader also announced a drastic cut to a tax on liquor, looking to boost a services sector struggling with fewer tourists and weak sentiment.
“We must maintain our development momentum and self-renewal, and that we must embrace changes while staying principled, innovative and flexible in meeting challenges and opportunities,” Lee said in his annual policy address Wednesday.
The Hang Seng Properties Index rose as much as 3.9% after Lee announced the relaxed mortgage rules, outperforming the main Hang Seng Index.
Chinese stocks fell to the verge of a correction in a sign of growing disappointment over the pace of stimulus rollout.
The CSI 300 Index ended the day 0.6% lower, bringing its declines from an Oct. 8 high to nearly 10%.
The next key event is a press briefing by the housing minister on Thursday, where authorities may provide more details of measures to support the country’s slumping property sector and bolster economic growth. Any disappointment from that event may reignite a selloff.
Chinese property stocks jumped ahead of the briefing, with a Bloomberg Intelligence gauge of developer shares gaining as much as 10% after shedding 7% on Tuesday. The sector has been at the center of investor focus, with stocks seeing wild swings as policy expectations waxed and waned.
Minister Ni Hong will be the latest senior economic official to speak in public about the government’s pivot toward stabilizing growth, after People’s Bank of China Governor Pan Gongsheng, Minister of Finance Lan Fo’an and the chairman of the country’s economic planning agency, Zheng Shanjie.
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