HK-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge port handles record number of daily passenger vehicles

The Zhuhai port of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge in southern China's Guangdong Province handled 26,882 passenger vehicles on Sunday, including 18,668 outbound passenger vehicles, both record highs.

During the first eight days (Feb 15-22) of the nine-day Spring Festival holiday, the Zhuhai port handled 175,000 inbound and outbound passenger vehicles, up 11.2 year on year.

During the period, 135,000 trips by vehicles carrying plates from Hong Kong or Macao were recorded at the port, up by 16.3 percent.

The stocks in Hong Kong edged down on Tuesday, while Japanese shares closed higher, said Timothy Pope, a market analyst for China Global Television Network (CGTN).

While Chinese mainland stocks closed higher on Tuesday, the first trading day after the nine-day Spring Festival, or Chinese New Year, holiday, Hong Kong's stock market ended lower with the benchmark Hang Seng Index down 1.82 percent to close at 26,590.32 points.

On Monday, Hong Kong's stock market ended higher with the benchmark Hang Seng Index up 2.53 percent to close at 27,081.91 points. The analyst attributed the increase largely to the U.S. Supreme Court's tariff ruling, which said on Feb 20 that the U.S. President Donald Trump's sweeping tariffs under a law meant for use in national emergencies are illegal.

"Hong Kong's market didn't have quite as long a holiday as we enjoyed the Chinese mainland and had its tariff ruling bump yesterday, when Hang Seng added almost 2.5 percent. Today though things slipped back. We saw the index down 1.8 percent, mirroring a pull-back on Wall Street overnight," said Pope.

The analyst pointed out that one of the most closely watched events on the bourse is a takeover by Panamanian authorities of two Panama Canal ports operated by Hong Kong-based conglomerate CK Hutchison.

"One of the major movers was investment holding company CK Hutchison, which had all those port contracts along the Panama Canal, until they were ruled to be in violation of Panama's constitution by Panamanian courts. Two rival port contractors -- Maersk and MSC have taken over operations at the moment and CK Hutchison's subsidiary staff have been removed from those ports today under the threat of prosecution if they remain. This story is still far from over. CKH told the Hong Kong Stock Exchange today that the court-ordered takeover is unlawful and that the company is considering legal action both within the Panama and internationally as well. The ruling was made at the end of January, as it said, but was only fully officially published on Monday. The Hong Kong government has also weighed in on this, issuing a statement, saying that Panama should respect the spirit of business deals and commit to making the country a fair business environment. CKH shares were down 2.7 percent today," said Pope.

As for Japan, the 225-issue Nikkei Stock Average ended up 495.39 points, or 0.87 percent, from Friday at 57,321.09. The broader Topix index finished 7.50 points, or 0.20 percent, higher at 3,815.98.

The analyst attributed the increases largely to optimism on huge investment opportunities generated from Nvidia's reported plan to invest in OpenAI.

"Over in Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 rose after a long weekend in Japan, adding 0.9 percent. A lot of that was on boosted tech investment hopes. The major fuel for those gains are reports of a potential investment by Nvidia into OpenAI. Reuters has reported that the chip maker and the AI developer are close to agreeing terms for a 30-billion U.S. dollar deal. This would almost certainly mean more data centers on which to train AI models and more chips to be made, all of which need Japanese tech. Some of the biggest companies on the Nikkei are tech infrastructure providers like chip testing equipment makers and fiber optic cable manufacturers. One of the latter -- Furukawa Electric, rose 15 percent today," said Pope.

The analyst noted that shares of Japanese arms makers dipped.

"Elsewhere on the Japanese markets we saw defense-linked stocks fall. That came after the Chinese government published an export control list that is aimed at slowing what it called Japan's re-militarization," said Pope.