Hong Kong Stock Market Midday Review: The Hang Seng Index plummeted by 1.75%. Tech stocks, insurance stocks, and semiconductor stocks fell, while gold stocks rose against the trend.

The Hong Kong stock market's three major indexes opened lower and continued to decline in the morning session. The Hang Seng Tech Index fell sharply by 2.2% nearing the lunch break, closing down 1.87%. The Hang Seng Index and the National Enterprises Index dropped by 1.75% and 1.16%, respectively, with the Hang Seng Index falling below 25,500 points. Most major tech stocks that had been rebounding recently were sluggish, with Baidu and Alibaba both down over 3%, Xiaomi and JD.com down over 2%, and Tencent down by 1.8%, followed by Meituan and NetEase. Reports indicate that China has begun taxing 20% on insurance earnings in Hong Kong, leading to a significant drop in insurance stocks. Additionally, influenced by a decline in overseas chip stocks, semiconductor stocks related to memory also collectively fell. On the other hand, gold prices surged, leading gold stocks to outperform, while optical communication stocks rebounded after a sharp drop the previous day.