Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited (HKEx) announced today (Wednesday) a closing auction session for its securities market will commence on 26 May 2008. The target date takes into consideration system preparations by Exchange Participants and the scheduled introduction of five-digit stock codes in April 2008.
The results of a public consultation conducted by HKEx earlier this year indicated broad market support for the introduction of a closing auction session. Based on the results, which were included in the Consultation Conclusions published in July this year, HKEx announced the closing auction session would be introduced subject to formal approval of necessary rule amendments by the Securities and Futures Commission. Such approval was recently granted.
After implementation of the closing auction session, the closing prices of securities will be determined by an auction mechanism, similar to that currently adopted in the Pre-opening Session. The implementation model for the closing auction session has been set out in Part C of the Consultation Conclusions.
“Closing auction is an international practice which aims at providing a fair and market-driven method of closing a trading session and determining closing prices. Our auction mechanism is based on market consultation and would address the need of various market participants,” said HKEx Head of Cash Market Eric Yip. “HKEx is committed to continuously enhancing its trading infrastructure based on market demand.”
The effective trading hours of the securities and derivatives markets will be extended correspondingly with the implementation of the closing auction session. Certain trading arrangements upon the approach of a typhoon will also be modified. Details are shown in the following tables.
Table 1 - Closing Time of the Securities Market
Table 5 – Trading arrangement for Stock Index Futures And Options (SIFO) Contracts, HIBOR Futures Contracts and Exchange Fund Notes (EFN) Futures Contracts upon the approach of a typhoon, effective 26 May 2008