Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited (HKEx) announced today (Sunday) that the first round of market rehearsal (MR1) for Shanghai-Hong Kong Stock Connect has been completed smoothly and all the planned scenarios in the rehearsal were covered.

The two-day MR1 was conducted yesterday (Saturday) and today.  It allowed Participants to ascertain their system readiness for the programme.  Both Northbound and Southbound trading processes, as well as clearing and settlement cycles in Hong Kong and Shanghai, were verified.

The exercise also provided the opportunity for Participants to familiarise themselves with the trading features of Northbound trading and test their trading and clearing operations.

On Saturday, among other things, one of the Northbound stocks was simulated to have its aggregate foreign shareholding reaching 28 per cent, and further buy orders of that stock were not accepted until the shareholding lowered to below 26 per cent.

Today's rehearsal, among other things, simulated the scenario where the Northbound daily quota was exceeded, and no further buy orders were accepted for the remainder of the trading session.

This weekend's MR1, together with last weekend's connectivity test and the next round of market rehearsal (MR2) scheduled for 13 September, is designed to enable Participants to verify their readiness to participate in Shanghai-Hong Kong Stock Connect at launch.  As our normal practice, HKEx will conduct a detailed analysis of all the testing results after this market rehearsaland take appropriate follow-up actions.

A total of 97 Exchange Participants (EPs), accounting for about 80 per cent of the total market turnover, and 108 CCASS Participants participated in this weekend's MR1.

* CCASS stands for Central Clearing and Settlement System

Ends