SHANGHAI: China stocks closed down on Friday, tracking regional peers lower amid strength in the US dollar and a pullback in technology shares, with strong foreign outflows weighing on the market.

Foreign portfolio flows have turned. About 33 billion yuan ($4.54 billion) left the mainland this month via the Northbound leg of the Stock Connect Scheme, following four months of net inflows. The Southbound leg also reported 129 billion yuan of outflows from the mainland to Hong Kong so far this year.

Additionally, investors remained cautious as the Chinese Communist Party’s central committee is set to gather in July for a key meeting known as a plenum, the third since the body of elite decision-makers was elected in 2022, focusing on reforms amid “challenges” at home and complexities abroad.

“For the upcoming ‘Third Plenum’, we expect the reform focus to be on both containing left-tail risks and growing right-tail potential for China in the ‘post-property’ era,” Goldman Sachs analysts said in a note.

“Rather than a ‘big bang’ policy initiative, we expect a continuation, or even scale-up, of existing reform measures on a multi-year horizon.”

At the close, the Shanghai Composite index was down 0.24% at 2,998.14.

The blue-chip CSI300 index was down 0.22%, with its financial sector sub-index lower by 0.12%, the consumer staples sector down 1.34%, the real estate index up 0.33% and the healthcare sub-index down 0.45%.

At the close of trade, the Hang Seng index was down 306.80 points or 1.67% at 18,028.52. The Hang Seng China Enterprises index fell 1.77% to 6,439.82.

The sub-index of the Hang Seng tracking energy shares dipped 2.5%, while the IT sector fell 1.88%, the financial sector ended 1.22% lower and the property sector declined 1.47%.

The smaller Shenzhen index ended down 0.09% and the start-up board ChiNext Composite index was weaker by 0.387%.

Around the region, MSCI’s Asia ex-Japan stock index was weaker by 0.68%, while Japan’s Nikkei index closed down 0.09%.