Hong Kong traders face shorter lunch break

Starting today, the lunch break for participants on the Hong Kong stock exchange will be cut to one hour from 90 minutes, as part of an effort by the Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing HKEx to extend trading hours and boost its ability to compete with regional and global peers.

Despite street protests by stock traders and brokers, from today onwards afternoon trading will resume at 1pm, instead of 1.30pm, resulting in a 30-minute extension of the trading day. The closing time for the afternoon session will remain unchanged at 4pm and the morning session will continue to run from 9.30am to noon.

This is the...