China stocks rallied in the U.,S., after the Hong Kong Stock Exchange started the Year Of The Rabbit with a nice hop following its Lunar New Year holiday break begun last Friday.
The exchange's benchmark Hang Seng Index rallied 2.4% during the session, acing a 10-month high in the process. China's mainland markets, including the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges, remain closed through Friday.
The Hang Seng Index has now powered up nearly 54% from a late October low. Over that same period, the smaller Shanghai Composite has climbed 12.8%. The Hang Seng ended 2022 down 15.5%. The Shanghai Composite took a 1.5% loss for the year.
The Hang Seng ended Thursday's session at its highest level since early March. It is also poised for a sixth straight week of gains, which would mark its longest advance since January 2020. The Hang Seng China Enterprises Index rallied nearly 3%. The index tracks mainland companies that trade on the Hong Kong exchange.
China Stocks: Pinduoduo, Weibo Lead
Holiday travel and box office data showed a strong revival in demand as the country exits its era of Covid Zero policies, Bloomberg reported. China stocks also received some lift from the gaming hub of Macau, which saw nearly 40,000 visitors enter from the mainland on the second day of the holiday. That was the largest surge since before the start of the pandemic.
Among China-based stocks trading in the U.S., Pinduoduo rallied 5.8% and Weibo spiked nearly 11%, while Baidu and JD.Com each posted gains around 2%.
Among ETFs, the KraneShares CSI China Internet ETF jumped 1.5%. The Xtrackers Harvest CSI 300 China A-Shares ETFASHR and iShares MSCI China ETF, which track stocks trading on the Hong Kong and Shanghai exchanges, rose 0.7% and 0.9%, respectively.
