China Stock Market Outlook for November 25, 2025: Key Things to Know Before the Opening Bell

Published: November 24, 2025

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China stock market preview for November 25, 2025 – Shanghai Composite, Shenzhen, CSI 300 and Hang Seng levels, Alibaba and Baidu AI news, China–Japan tensions, property risks, and key events investors are watching before the open.

1. Market recap: where China stands after Monday’s close

China goes into Tuesday’s session after a fragile rebound that only partly offsets last week’s sharp sell-off.

Mainland A‑shares: Chinese stocks finished almost flat on Monday. The Shanghai Composite Index inched up 0.05% to 3,836.77, while the Shenzhen Component Index rose 0.37% to 12,585.08. ^[1]
The blue‑chip CSI 300 slipped 0.1%, extending its underperformance versus smaller growth and defense names. ^[2]
According to Reuters, the market briefly hit a six‑week intraday low before bargain hunters and a rally in defense and tech names pulled the Shanghai benchmark back into positive territory. ^[3]

Sector performance on Monday:

Defense stocks jumped about 3.5%, making them the standout winners on the day. ^[4]
AI and semiconductor indices rebounded, rising roughly 0.8% and 1.8% respectively after a heavy tech sell‑off last week. ^[5]
Banks (-0.8%) and energy (-1.7%) dragged on the CSI 300, underlining persistent worries about credit quality and sluggish industrial demand. ^[6]

This modest uptick comes right after Chinese stocks logged their biggest weekly loss since late December 2024, as global tech names slumped and investors fretted over a lack of fresh domestic stimulus. ^[7]

Hong Kong: tech-led rebound on heavy flows

Hong Kong painted a much more upbeat picture:

The Hang Seng Index climbed about 1.97% to ~25,717, while the Hang Seng Tech Index rallied 2.7–2.8% on Monday. ^[8]
Alibaba surged roughly 4.7–5%, Tencent gained about 2.4%, and Baidu added around 4.2% in Hong Kong trading, helped by AI optimism and index‑related flows. ^[9]
Innovent Biologics, set to join the Hang Seng Index in the next quarterly review, jumped about 5.4%. ^[10]

Commentary from fund managers notes that Monday’s rally in Hong Kong was amplified by MSCI index rebalancing, which triggered heavy passive buying in large tech names, especially via Southbound Stock Connect. ^[11]

2. Global backdrop: Fed cut bets and Wall Street’s mood

The external environment heading into Tuesday’s China open is cautiously risk‑on:

Fed signals: New York Fed President John Williams said U.S. interest rates could move lower “in the near term” as the labour market softens, prompting traders to price roughly a 70–80% probability of a rate cut in December. ^[12]
U.S. & Europe: Wall Street bounced on Monday, with major U.S. indices higher and longer‑dated Treasury yields slipping to around 4.05%. European stocks also firmed as rate‑cut hopes spread. ^[13]
Asia overall: MSCI’s Asia‑Pacific index ex‑Japan advanced, but China continued to lag, with A‑shares barely up and CSI 300 slightly lower, underscoring lingering domestic concerns despite the global recovery in risk appetite. ^[14]

On the currency and rates side:

The onshore USD/CNY rate hovered around 7.10–7.11, near the stronger end of its recent range, as the People’s Bank of China (PBOC) continued to guide the yuan with a relatively firm daily fixing. ^[15]
China’s 10‑year government bond yield sat near 1.82%, reflecting easy domestic financial conditions but also signalling subdued growth expectations. ^[16]

The PBOC has been keeping liquidity ample, including hundreds of billions of yuan in reverse‑repo operations in November and a previously announced 800‑billion‑yuan six‑month repo operation earlier in the month. ^[17]

For Tuesday’s open, the net effect is:

Supportive global risk tone thanks to Fed cut expectations.
But domestic narratives (property, geopolitics, AI policy) remain the primary drivers of Chinese equities.

3. AI & tech in the spotlight: Alibaba, Baidu and “China’s Nvidia”

Alibaba’s Qwen AI app is exploding in popularity

One of the biggest micro‑stories for China tech right now is AI:

Alibaba’s Qwen AI app (a ChatGPT‑style assistant) has surpassed 10 million downloads within a week of its relaunch, according to multiple reports citing company and Bloomberg data. ^[18]
The strong uptake is seen as a sign that Alibaba’s push into consumer-facing AI is gaining traction and could help underpin its broader cloud and commerce ecosystem.

That momentum helped Alibaba’s Hong Kong‑listed shares rally around 4–5% on Monday, making the stock one of the day’s most actively bought names through Southbound Stock Connect. ^[19]

Crucially for Tuesday:

Alibaba is scheduled to report earnings after the Hong Kong close on Tuesday, November 25, which could make the stock and the broader China internet space particularly sensitive during the session. ^[20]

Baidu upgraded on AI & cloud optimism

AI momentum isn’t limited to Alibaba:

JPMorgan upgraded Baidu to “Overweight” from “Neutral” on Sunday/Monday, arguing that the investment case is shifting from legacy advertising to high‑growth AI and cloud, including in‑house Kunlun AI chips. ^[21]
The bank expects Baidu’s cloud revenue to grow sharply in 2025–26, driven by strong domestic demand for AI computing and policy support for China’s AI build‑out. ^[22]

Baidu’s shares jumped 4–8% across Hong Kong and U.S. trading sessions on the back of that upgrade, feeding the broader revival in China tech sentiment. ^[23]

Moore Threads: a new STAR Market AI champion

On the mainland, the AI hardware story is also heating up:

Moore Threads, often dubbed “China’s Nvidia,” completed China’s largest STAR Market IPO of 2025 on Monday, raising about 8 billion yuan at an issue price of 114.28 yuan per share. ^[24]
The GPU designer has rolled out four generations of architectures and targets trillion‑parameter large language models, but remains deeply loss‑making, with cumulative net losses nearing 5.9 billion yuan over recent years. ^[25]

The listing underscores Beijing’s drive to build a domestic GPU ecosystem but also adds competition to existing chip players, some of which are already under pressure from U.S. export controls and fickle investor sentiment.

Nvidia’s H200 and Chinese chipmakers

Adding to the complexity:

U.S. officials are in early talks about allowing Nvidia to sell its H200 AI chips to China under licences, a potential partial rollback of previous restrictions. ^[26]
Headlines about the possible move initially weighed on local Chinese chipmakers, which fear renewed competition, but chip‑related A‑shares bounced on Monday, with semiconductor indices rising around 1.8%. ^[27]

What this means for Tuesday:

Expect heightened focus on AI, cloud and semiconductor names in both Shanghai/Shenzhen and Hong Kong.
Any new commentary on Alibaba’s AI strategy, Baidu’s AI monetisation or Moore Threads’ first‑day trading performance could ripple through broader tech indices.

4. Geopolitics: China–Japan tensions hit airlines, boost defence

The biggest geopolitical overhang for Chinese markets right now is the rapidly intensifying diplomatic crisis with Japan over Taiwan.

“Red line” rhetoric

Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi recently said Japan could respond militarily if a Chinese attack on Taiwan threatened Japan’s security.
China’s foreign minister Wang Yi labelled the remarks a “red line” and a “shocking wrong signal,” warning of firm counter‑measures and taking the dispute to the United Nations. ^[28]

Travel boycott and flight cancellations

China’s response has gone well beyond diplomatic language:

Authorities have warned Chinese citizens against travelling to Japan, and cultural and tourism exchanges have been scaled back. ^[29]
Multiple reports estimate around 500,000 Japan‑bound flight bookings were cancelled within days of the travel warning, with more than 10 Chinese airlines offering full refunds through year‑end. ^[30]
As of Monday morning, at least 12 air routes between Chinese cities and Japan had cancelled all scheduled flights for the coming week, according to Chinese and Japanese media citing aviation trackers. ^[31]

Market impact: airlines vs defence

This has already translated into market moves:

Hong Kong‑listed Chinese airline stocks (such as Air China and China Eastern) fell roughly 1% on Monday as investors priced in lost traffic, weaker pricing power and elevated political risk. ^[32]
In contrast, the CSI Defense Index rallied about 3.5%, with investors interpreting the Taiwan‑related tensions and Japan’s missile deployments as supportive for demand in aerospace and defence suppliers. ^[33]

Heading into Tuesday’s open:

Airlines, tourism, travel platforms and Japan‑exposed consumer names in China and Hong Kong are likely to stay under pressure as cancellations continue.
Defence, cybersecurity and related industrial names may remain in focus if hawkish rhetoric persists.

5. Structural overhang: property slump and credit stress

While AI and geopolitics dominate headlines, the property sector remains the single biggest structural drag on China’s equity story.

Recent updates:

A long‑time China property bull at UBS has shifted stance, signalling that the four‑year real estate downturn is likely to persist, aligning with a growing Wall Street consensus that the sector’s recovery will be slow and uneven. ^[34]
China Vanke, the country’s second‑largest developer, reported a Q3 2025 loss of about US$2.3 billion and has needed support from state‑owned Shenzhen Metro Group, which extended loans and effectively stepped in as a stabilising shareholder. ^[35]
Separately, private equity group Gaw and other property‑linked borrowers have been forced into last‑minute loan extension talks, highlighting ongoing refinancing stress in commercial real estate. ^[36]

Even though property headlines on November 24 were more incremental than explosive, they reinforce a message investors already know:

Property, banks and construction‑related sectors still face a long, bumpy adjustment.

That helps explain why bank stocks fell on Monday, and why any short‑term rallies in property names remain fragile. ^[37]

6. Policy expectations: waiting for December’s Central Economic Work Conference

With no major new stimulus unveiled in recent weeks, many domestic analysts say the A‑share market is in a “policy vacuum” phase.

A widely cited note from Chasing Securities, reported by Reuters, argues that the market will likely be dominated by range‑bound fluctuations until China’s annual Central Economic Work Conference (CEWC) in December, with large‑cap blue chips potentially taking the lead once policy direction is clarified. ^[38]
The CEWC is expected to set the macro priorities and fiscal stance for 2026, including how aggressively Beijing is prepared to support consumption, local governments and the property sector. ^[39]

Near‑term data:

This week’s calendar includes China’s October industrial profits (due November 27), which will provide another read on the manufacturing recovery after profits for the first nine months of 2025 grew 3.2% year‑on‑year. ^[40]
Hong Kong will release October external merchandise trade data on Tuesday, November 25, potentially affecting logistics, port and export‑linked stocks. ^[41]

For Tuesday’s open, the main implication is:

No immediate policy catalyst is expected during the session, so markets are likely to trade off earnings, geopolitics and global risk tone rather than fresh stimulus headlines.

7. Key events and themes to watch on November 25, 2025

Here’s what market participants are likely watching before the opening bell in Shanghai, Shenzhen and Hong Kong:

1. Big‑tech earnings and AI headlines

Alibaba earnings after the Hong Kong close: commentary on Qwen AI monetisation, cloud margins, e‑commerce competition and any capital‑return plans could influence trading throughout the day as investors position ahead of the release. ^[42]
Other notable names on Tuesday’s global earnings radar include Chow Tai Fook Jewellery, Nio, Tongcheng Travel and several U.S. tech companies, according to Saxo’s Asia Market Quick Take – which can shape risk sentiment around Chinese ADRs and Hong Kong tech. ^[43]

2. China–Japan headlines

Any escalation or easing in the Taiwan‑related diplomatic spat—for example, fresh remarks from Beijing or Tokyo, new travel advisories, or updates on seafood bans—could move:
- Airlines & tourism (China Eastern, Air China, travel agencies, hotel chains).
- Defence, shipbuilding and aerospace stocks, which outperformed on Monday. ^[44]

3. Global risk tone overnight

Because China trades after the U.S. close:

Markets will digest Monday’s and Tuesday’s Wall Street sessions, updated Fed rate‑cut odds and any new U.S. data surprises that move Treasury yields or the dollar. ^[45]
Watch USD/CNY and offshore CNH levels: a stable or slightly firmer yuan (around the 7.10 handle) tends to be supportive for foreign inflows and equity sentiment at the margin. ^[46]

4. Ongoing property and credit news

Further headlines on developers’ refinancing, local government financing vehicles (LGFVs) or potential targeted support programs could move property, bank and construction stocks, even if details are incremental. ^[47]

8. How it all adds up for Tuesday’s China open

Putting the pieces together, here’s the high‑level picture going into November 25, 2025:

Supportive forces:

Global markets are in a risk‑on mood thanks to rising expectations of a December Fed rate cut and softer U.S. yields. ^[48]
AI and internet leaders like Alibaba and Baidu have regained momentum, supported by strong Qwen app adoption, bullish analyst calls and MSCI‑driven flows. ^[49]
The yuan is stable and domestic bond yields are low, indicating an accommodative financial backdrop. ^[50]

Headwinds and risks:

The China–Japan diplomatic crisis continues to hurt travel, airlines and tourism‐related activity, while raising uncertainty around regional security. ^[51]
The property downturn shows no clear end in sight, with fresh signs of stress at major developers and in commercial real estate. ^[52]
Investors are still waiting for clarity from December’s Central Economic Work Conference, leaving markets vulnerable to swings in sentiment as they trade on expectations rather than concrete policy. ^[53]

What market participants are likely to do (in general terms):

Short‑term traders may focus on:
- Volatility in large‑cap tech and AI plays ahead of Alibaba’s earnings.
- Relative moves between defence vs airlines/travel as new China–Japan headlines emerge.
Long‑term investors may continue to:
- Monitor how AI and high‑end manufacturing themes develop relative to the still‑fragile property and banking sectors.
- Watch for signals on fiscal stance and reform priorities once Beijing’s year‑end policy meetings get underway.

9. Important note

This article is for informational and journalistic purposes only. It is not investment advice, and it does not take into account your personal financial situation, objectives or risk tolerance. If you are considering trading or investing in Chinese or Hong Kong markets, it’s wise to do your own research and, where appropriate, consult a qualified financial professional.

China’s Big Push For A Tech-Driven Stock Market Boom | CNA Correspondent