Chinese Tech Stocks Saw Sizable Gains in Hong Kong 

Shares in Asia-Pacific were mostly higher on Monday as stocks in Hong Kong reached great results. 

In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng index added 2.23% by Monday afternoon. Shares of tech giant Meituan in Hong Kong jumped 9.22%. The country’s market regulator on Friday said it fined Meituan about 3.4 billion Chinese yuan ($527.71 million) after finding it guilty of monopolistic practices. The fine imposed by China’s State Administration for Market Regulation equated to 3% of Meituan’s 2020 revenue.

Nevertheless, that was far smaller than the 18.23 billion yuan ($2.8 billion) fine that another tech giant Alibaba had been slapped several months ago. 

Meituan was not alone as other Chinese tech stocks in Hong Kong also saw sizable gains. Tencent added 2.99% and Alibaba jumped 9.39%. The Hang Seng Tech index gained 3.67%. 

Mainland Chinese stocks on Monday 

Mainland Chinese stocks also strengthened their positions on Monday. The Shanghai composite added 0.38% while the Shenzhen component sat fractionally higher.

In Japan, the Nikkei 225 gained 1.6% while the Topix index added 1.57%.

In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 dropped 0.38%.

Markets in South Korea are closed for a holiday.

In Singapore, aviation-related stocks jumped on Monday, with Singapore Airlines soaring 6.63% while SATS added 3.6%. Aviation-related stocks rose thanks to the government’s decision. 

Two days ago, the city-state made an important announcement. It decided to reopen new travel lanes for vaccinated visitors from 8 more countries. It will launch more vaccinated travel lanes (VTL) with 8 countries including Canada, Italy, the U.S., and the U.K. Countries stated above are already open to travelers from the city-state. Consequently, the vaccinated travel lanes will restore two-way quarantine-free travel between the countries mentioned above and Singapore. 

Travelers will have to take Covid-19 tests to ensure that they aren’t infected with the virus before entering the country. The country announced the initiative with South Korea on Friday. It already started similar arrangements with Germany as well as Brunei in September.

Singapore is trying to adapt to the new reality. The country maintained a zero-Covid strategy for the most part of the pandemic. But the city-state started opening up after the population’s vaccination rate surpassed more than 80%. Nonetheless, after loosening restrictions, the number of cases reached daily record highs. So, the country’s government decided to tighten some Covid restrictions for the unvaccinated. As a result, people who are not vaccinated will no longer be allowed to enter malls.