Hong Kong stocks went down 107.98 points, or 0.49 percent, to close at 21,884.74 on Thursday.
The benchmark Hang Seng Index traded between 21,725.67 and 22, 087.12. Turnover totaled 72.4 billion HK dollars (about 9.28 billion U.S. dollars).
The Hang Seng China Enterprises Index, which tracks the so- called Hong Kong-listed Chinese companies, fell 113.60 points, or 0.95 percent, to close at 11,893.50.
All four sub-indices were lower, with Finance suffering the biggest loss by decreasing 0.67 percent while the other three outperforming the benchmark index but still landing in negative territory.
Banking giant HSBC fell 1.1 percent to 76.15 HK dollars, contributing negative 37 points to index change. Another heavyweight ChinaMobile gained 2.26 percent to close at 76.9 HK dollars, which by coincidence exactly offset the contribution by HSBC to the index change.
For mainland-based banks, both CCB and ICBC were unchanged on the day. Bank of China went down 0.86 percent to 3.45 HK dollars and Agricultural Bank of China fell 1.46 percent to 4.04 HK dollars.
Property insurer PICC plunged 11.25 percent to 12.46 HK dollars, on rumors that the mainland will reform the car insurance rates in coming days.
The two leading mainland-based insurers Ping An and China Life were soft, dropping 1.43 percent and 0.98 percent respectively.
For major property shares, losers greatly outnumbered gainers. Cheung Kong edged down 0.08 percent to 119.6 HK dollars. According to the half-year revenue report of the company released on Thursday, the developer''s net profit was up 169 percent in the first six months year-on-year.
Residential developer went down 0.6 percent to 115.3 HK dollars and Henderson slumped 1.45 percent to 47.65 HK dollars. Hang Lung retreated 0.33 percent to 29.9 HK dollars.
With crude oil price falling overnight, all the three oil constituents headed lower. China''s largest oil and gas producer PetroChina dropped 1.29 percent to 10.7 HK dollars. The country''s top refiner Sinopec fell 1.21 percent to 7.37 HK dollars. Offshore producer CNOOC was the worst-performing constituent, down 2.36 percent to 16.52 HK dollars. (1 U.S. dollar = 7.798 HK dollars)
Source: Xinhua