Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing (HKEx) has set out its performance from January to March 2014 in its quarterly report.
The average daily turnover value of equity products in the first quarter was HK$55.1 billion on the main board and HK$1 billion on the Growth Enterprise Market (GEM), a decline of 5% and an increase of 399% respectively compared to the first quarter of 2013.
The first quarter of 2014 saw an increase in primary market activity with total equity funds raising HK$112.4 billion, compared to HK$63.8 billion in the first quarter of 2013.
Funds raised through initial public offerings amounted to HK$46.0 billion, an increase of 463% compared to Q1 2013.
In January 2014, HKEx began offering after-hours trading of Mini-Hang Seng index futures and Mini H-share index futures and also extended block trading facility from the day session to the after-hours futures trading session.
In the first quarter of 2014, the 668,720 contracts that were traded during the after hours session equaled about 6% of the day session’s volume.
Later this year, HKEx will consider extending the closing time to around midnight in order to increase the overlap with US trading hours.
US$/CNH futures had a record high trading volume of US$632 million in notional value on 19 March 2014 and a record high open interest equaling US$2.4 billion of notional value on 14 February 2014.