Why Alibaba, Nio And Other Stocks Are Sliding In Hong Kong Today

Shares of U.S.-listed Chinese firms traded significantly lower in Hong Kong on Wednesday morning, with major tech names like Alibaba Group Holding BABA, JD.com Inc JD, Baidu Inc BIDU, and Tencent Holdings TCEHY in the red.

Among electric vehicle makers, NIO Inc NIO and Li Auto Inc LI traded on a muted note, while Xpeng Inc XPEV gained about 1.27% after a lower start.

Shares of these Chinese companies ended significantly lower in U.S. markets on Tuesday.

Global Markets Recap: At the time of writing, the benchmark Hang Seng Index pared early gains and traded on a muted note amid mixed sentiments from global peers.

In the U.S., the indices traded lower, with Nasdaq Composite Index falling as much as 2.35%.

Elsewhere, Australia's ASX 200 and Shanghai's SSE Composite Index pared gains to trade 0.64% and 0.34% higher, respectively, while Japan's Nikkei 225 was down 0.13%.

Macro Factors: SEC's international affairs chief, YJ Fischer, said, "significant issues remain" in reaching a deal with China over a long-running auditing compliance dispute around US-listed Chinese companies, according to Reuters.

At the Quad summit, the leaders of the four quad nations — U.S., India, Japan, and Australia — launched a maritime initiative to combat illegal fishing and pledged to invest more than $50 billion in developing infrastructure in the Indo-Pacific region to counter China's growing influence.

Also, China's central bank said that its top officials met with major lenders this week to review credit flows in the system and urged lenders to quicken loan approvals and maintain the stable supply of financing to the property sector.

Company In News: According to data from Benzinga Pro, a whale with a lot of money to spend has taken a noticeably bearish stance on Alibaba. Looking at the options history for Alibaba, 21 strange trades were detected.

Mizuho analyst James Lee is incrementally positive on Baidu and JD.Com among other stocks.

The Chinese electric vehicle startup Nio plans to set up lithium-ion battery labs and a pilot production line for batteries in Shanghai.

Meanwhile, JP Morgan and Barclays maintained 'overweight' on XPeng and lowered the price target to $35 and $30, whereas Bank of America Securities maintained 'Buy' but lowered the price target to $40.