Hong Kong share prices rose 0.4 percent on Monday on follow-up buying amid a lack of fresh incentives, dealers said.
Dealers said the market was led higher led by financial stocks but with the gains capped by weakness in telecom companies.
The key Hang Seng index closed up 57.83 points at 15,102.36 on turnover of 6.73 billion Hong Kong dollars (863 million US).
"I think buyers will not be very aggressive as local stocks lack direction, except to follow leads from the US market," said Frederick Tsang, director at China Ever bright Research.
He said the index moved within a narrow range in low turnover, reflecting investors' caution.
Marty Chan, an analyst with Polaris Securities, said financial stocks were sharply higher led by HSBC, which continued to benefit from its increasing globalization.
"HSBC is expanding its business in the Middle East, and its sources of income will come from different parts of the world," he said.
"In terms of its investment banking business, investors are hopeful that it may eventually merge with Merrill Lynch," he said.
HSBC was up 3.00 dollars at 110.50, Bank of East Asia was 10 cents higher at 17.25 and Hang Seng Bank was up 1.75 at 90.00.
Chan said hi-tech and telecom stocks were mixed to lower after the trading suspension in Pacific Century Cyber Works (PCCW), as investors continued to reduce their exposure in the two sectors, amid their volatility in overseas markets. PCCW last traded on Friday at 6.50 dollars.
China Mobile was down 1.50 dollars at 52.25, Hutchison was up 50 cents at 96.75 and China Unicom was down 30 cents at 16.05.
Among properties, Cheung Kong was down 50 cents at 89.25 dollars and New World Development was up 10 cents at 9.70.
Cheung Kong Infrastructure was up five cents at 11.80 dollars after its joint venture with Group GTM and Daewoo Corp to build a 1.7 billion US dollars infrastructure project in South Korea -- HONG KONG (AFP)
© 2000 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
