SHANGHAI - The Trump administration's move to ban US residents from doing business with Tencent Holdings' WeChat app rippled through Chinese markets, on Friday erasing US$46 billion from the Internet giant's market value and sending the yuan to its biggest slump in two weeks.
China's CSI300 index fell 1.7 per cent to 4,682.02 points at the end of the morning session, while the Shanghai Composite Index lost 1.5 per cent to 3,337.43 points. Tech stocks fell across the board on Friday. By the midday break, Shenzhen's tech-heavy start-up board ChiNext fell 2.6 per cent, the newly launched STAR 50 index shed 3.5 per cent, while the Hang Seng tech index slumped 4.7 per cent.
Before Friday's drop Tencent was worth US$686 billion, making it the world's eighth-largest by market capitalization and bigger than Berkshire Hathaway Inc. Its huge size means it occupies a dominant position on global indexes. The firm accounts for more than 6 per cent of MSCI Inc's developing nation gauge and 4 per cent of its Asian Pacific measure.