Hong Kong stocks rebounded on Friday as Chinese regulators started the second operation of the rescue package for the country's economy introduced in September by the authorities by providing support for institutional buying.

As part of the rescue package, about 20 fund managers, securities firms, and insurance companies received a swap facility of 55 billion yuan worth of liquid assets that can be used as collateral for borrowing to buy stocks.

The Hang Seng Index rose 0.70%, or 136.95 points, to close at 19,760.27 on Friday. The Hang Seng China Enterprises Index rose 0.97%, or 68.72 points, to end at 7,159.28.

Hong Kong's provisionally estimated retail sales for November 2024 dropped 7.3% to HK$31.7 billion from the same period last year, with the value of total retail sales for the 11 months ended November decreasing by an estimated 7.1% compared with the previous year, a Thursday Census and Statistics Department's release reported.

In market news, Xiaomi (HKG:1810) jumped nearly 7% on Friday's close with Meituan (HKG:3690) and Alibaba Group (HKG:9988) following suit with over 2% and nearly 2% respective rise. SMIC (HKG:0981) recovered from yesterday's fall and closed nearly 2% higher on Friday.

In corporate news, SF Holding (HKG:6936, SHE:002352) repurchased 20,771,358 A shares between April 30, 2024, and Dec. 31, 2024, for about 758.0 million yuan under the second phase of its 2024 repurchase plan, raising its shares over 3% on Friday's close.