One US-listed stock is bucking the trend, though.

Nio, the Chinese electric car company, has surged 40% after posting better-than-expected results.

The firm dubbed China’s answer to Tesla reported a smaller loss than expected, thanks to a pick-up in revenues and higher vehicle deliveries.

Marketwatch has more details:

Nio reported a net loss for the quarter to Sept. 30 of 2.52 billion renminbi ($352.8 million), or RMB2.48 per ordinary share, after a loss of RMB9.76 billion, or RMB42.59 a share, in the same period a year ago.

Excluding nonrecurring items, such as share-based compensation expenses and accretion on redeemable non-controlling interests to redemption value, the adjusted loss was RMB2.45 billion, or RMB2.38 a share, beating the FactSet consensus of a loss of RMB2.53 a share.

Nice timing by Nio, with Tesla making its first Chinese deliveries today.

Nio’s shipments were still low, at just 4,799 vehicles in the last quarter. But that’s a 35% increase, including a new five-seater SUV.

Wall Street appears to have a post-Christmas hangover (and it’s not alone, eh?!).

Stocks are down in early trading, knocking 182 points off the Dow to 28,463.

2019 has still been a vintage year for the US market, with equities up over 20%. But the fabled Santa Rally has taken a wrong turn....

Just in: The US trade deficit has unexpectedly shrunk.

Imports into America fell by 1.3% in November, while exports rose by 0.7%, according to the Census Bureau.

That narrows the trade deficit to $63.2bn, down from $66.5bn a month ago, and much less than the $68.7 billion expected:

That will cheer the White House, given president Trump’s attempts to cut the trade gap (with mixed results).

Some 1,200 kilometres north east of Hong Kong, Tesla has been delivering its fist Chinese-manufactured cars -- to some of its own staff.

It’s a major major milestone in the electric carmaker’s global expansion efforts, says my colleague Jasper Jolly:

The first 15 Model 3 cars to roll off the line at the US carmaker’s Shanghai factory went to customers who were Tesla employees and were handed over in a ceremony at the plant on Monday.

Tesla will ramp up production during January, marking the start of a full-on assault on the world’s largest car market. It has taken less than a year from the start of construction of the $5bn (£3.8bn) Shanghai factory in January to the delivery of the first vehicles.

The factory, first announced in July 2018, is Tesla’s first facility outside the US and will have an annual capacity of 150,000 Model 3 cars per year, compared with 350,000 in its main factory in Fremont, California.

More here:

European stock markets are not following Asia’s rally today.

Instead, the main indices are down on the City’s final full trading day of 2019 (tomorrow is a half-day).

The FTSE 100 is now down 30 points, or 0.4%, in very thin trading. That breaks an 11-day run of daily gains.

Just 90 million trades have taken place across the FTSE 100 so far today, compared to perhaps 800m on a typical day. That suggests many investors have sloped off until the new year, preserving profits after seeing the Footsie jump by 13% this year.

Stocks are suffering because the euro and the pound are both gaining ground against the US dollar, to €1.118 and $1.313 respectively.

Edward Moya of trading firm OANDA reckons investors are expecting that American interest rates will remain on hold for some time (following three rate cuts since the summer).

The dollar seems has seen all its gains wiped away in the final quarter of the year and we could see that trend continue as the global re-acceleration gains momentum.

With the Fed on hold and the rest of the world starting to have a brighter outlook, we could see more central banks look to abandon negative rates. The reasons for further dollar weakness in 2020 are growing, but the main remains that the Fed will be on hold for the foreseeable future and we should see the euro and commodity currencies outperform.

Recession warnings aren’t deterring demonstrators from organising major protests later this week.

Multiple protests are planned for New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day, which are designed to disrupt festivities and shopping in the City.

Reuters has more details:

Events dubbed “Suck the Eve” and “Shop With You” are set for New Year’s Eve on Tuesday in areas including the party district of Lan Kwai Fong, the picturesque Victoria Harbour, and popular shopping malls, according to notices on social media.

A pro-democracy march on January 1 has been given police permission and will start from a large park in bustling Causeway Bay and end in the central business district.

Organisers Civil Human Rights Front were behind the peaceful million-plus marches in June and held a mass protest earlier in December, which they said around 800,000 people attended.

“On New Year’s Day, we need to show our solidarity ... to resist the government. We hope Hong Kong people will come onto the streets for Hong Kong’s future,” said Jimmy Sham, a leader of the group.

Back in the UK, the number of mortgages approved by banks has jumped, despite Brexit uncertainty and this month’s general election.

Mortgage approvals for home purchases by the main high street banks in November 2019 were 6.8% higher than a year ago, while remortgage approvals were 12.7% higher.

UK Finance, the industry trade body, also reports that credit card spending fell by 3.3% year-on-year last month to £10.9bn.

Andrew Montlake, managing director of UK mortgage broker, Coreco, reckons some households decided to nail down their mortgage before Britons went to the polling stations:

“Home purchase and remortgage approvals in November held up exceptionally well given that the country was in full General Election mode.

“For a lot of British households, November was a classic case of better the devil you know.

“They chose to get their houses in order and secure a mortgage before a potentially disruptive election result.

Despite these recession warnings, Hong Kong’s stock market has closed at a five-month high today.

The Hang Seng index gained 93 points, or 0.33%, to 28,319.

China’s market also had a good day, gaining more than 1%.

Stocks rallied after Beijing announced plans to reform its interest rate system. Commercial banks are being asked to use fresh benchmark rates for new loans, which are more closely aligned to market rates. Analysts think this will lead to lower borrowing costs, stimulating the economy.

Thousands of protesters have taken to the streets in Hong Kong in recent days, as the pro-democracy action enter their seventh month.

These latest demonstrations will have deterred some consumers from hitting the shops, hurting retail spending and helping to keep the economy in recession.

The Financial Times has a piece about how Hong Kong retailers have suffered a bad Christmas period:

It was clear even in November, when protesters set a Christmas tree on fire in the busy Festival Walk mall, that this season was going to be brutal for Hong Kong retailers — the mall will be closed until some time in the first quarter next year, according to its owner Mapletree North Asia Commercial Trust.

Since protests first started in April, visitor numbers have collapsed. In October, the most recent month for which data is available, arrivals to Hong Kong were down 43.7 per cent on a year earlier, depriving the city’s businesses of more than 2.5m tourists, the overwhelming majority of them from mainland China.

Overnight visitors spent an average of HK$6,614 (US$850) each on their stays in 2018, according to the Hong Kong Tourism Board. Along with hotels, restaurants and shop owners were the main beneficiaries, and the fall-off in tourism has battered retailers.

Just in: Hong Kong’s imports and exports have both fallen, as its recession dampens demand for goods and services.

The Census and Statistics Department has reported that imports slumped by 5.8% year-on-year in November, while exports declined by 1.4%.

Hong Kong’s administration is expected to take fresh measures to support growth in 2020.

Alongside his recession warning, Paul Chan says that his budget, due in February, will include measures for:

“supporting enterprises, safeguarding jobs, revitalising the economy and easing poverty”.

Hong Kong’s chief secretary, Matthew Cheung, has also warned that the City faces “tough tests and challenges in 2020”.

In his own blogpost, Cheung wrote:

“The year 2019 has been a year of unremitting shocks and turbulence to our community and our economy.

The past six months have been tough for us, but we will soldier on.”