Hong Kong wipes out 2,000% stock gains after regulator reins in speculation

The S&P/Hong Kong GEM Index has declined 2.2% this year, while the main exchange's Hang Seng Index has climbed 9.7%

The world’s most volatile new stocks are vanishing from Hong Kong after regulators tightened oversight of the city’s small-cap Growth Enterprise Market.

Stocks debuting on GEM in the past 12 months rose an average 23 per cent on their first day of trading, down from an eye-popping 605 per cent for the year through January 2017, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The performance in the recent period is more in line with the main exchange’s first-day gain of 18 per cent.

A crackdown by Hong Kong Exchanges & Clearing Ltd and the Securities and Futures Commission helped rein in extreme volatility