Why Alibaba, Nio, Chinese Peers Are Struggling For Direction In Hong Kong Today

Shares of U.S.-listed Chinese companies were nearly flat in Hong Kong on Tuesday morning. 

Major tech names like Alibaba Group Holding BABA, JD.com Inc JD, Tencent Holdings TCEHY and Baidu Inc BIDU were slightly in the green, as were electric vehicle makers Nio Inc NIO and Xpeng Inc XPEV.  

Li Auto Inc LI, however, was down marginally at press time.

Shares of these Chinese companies ended higher in Hong Kong on Monday when U.S. markets remained closed for Memorial Day.

Global Markets Recap: At press time, the benchmark Hang Seng Index was up 0.20%.

Elsewhere, Asian peers showed mixed sentiment, with Japan's Nikkei 225 and Shanghai's SSE Composite Index trading 0.11% and 0.34% higher, respectively, while Australia's ASX 200 was down 0.46%.

Macro Factors: Shanghai is set to lift its strict COVID-19 lockdown from June 1.

Official Chinese factory activity data for May showed vast improvement compared with the previous month. The National Bureau of Statistics said the official manufacturing purchasing managers index rose to 49.6 in May from 47.4 in April.

Oil prices also jumped after the European Union late on Monday banned 90% of Russian crude by the end of the year. The embargo comes as a sixth sanction by the EU on Russia since it invaded Ukraine.

Company In News: A San Francisco-based fund Dodge & Cox, accumulated $1.26 billion worth of stocks of Alibaba, JD.com, and Baidu over the past four quarters, according to an SMCP report, citing 13F filings.

A Barrons report showed that Generation Investment Management, co-founded and chaired by former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, loaded up on shares of Alibaba, and trimmed its stake in Microsoft CorpMSFT and Cisco Systems Inc CSCO.

According to local media news reports, Nio is reportedly planning to set up a new plant in the U.S. as it hires for several positions related to making vehicles.