Asian shares fall, mixed session on Wall St
Seoul, Tokyo and Hong Kong settled lower, while Shanghai ended with gains; European markets were trading lower; US markets ended on a mixed note on Tuesday
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Tokyo: Asian shares were mostly lower Wednesday after a mixed session on Wall Street following a three-day holiday weekend.Shares fell in Tokyo, Seoul, Sydney, Hong Kong and Shanghai. Oil prices rose.
The International Monetary Fund raised its forecast for China’s economic outlook, saying it expects the No 2 economy to grow at a 5 per cent annual pace this year. Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 shed 0.8 per cent in afternoon trading to 38,533.42. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 dipped 1.3 per cent to 7,665.60. South Korea’s Kospi lost 1.6 per cent to 2,679.75. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng slipped 2.1 per cent to 18,425.09, while the Shanghai Composite edged 0.2 per cent lower to 3,102.04.
On Wall Street, most US stocks fell in a quiet day of trading Tuesday, after bond yields ticked higher. Nearly three out of every four stocks fell within the S&P 500. But strength for a handful of highly influential Big Tech stocks helped the index hold up overall. It edged higher by 1.32, or less than 0.1 per cent, to 5,306.04. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.6 per cent to 38,852.86. The Nasdaq composite rode the strength of tech stocks to gain 0.6 per cent, to 17,019.88 and added to its latest all-time high set on Friday. Nvidia led the way and jumped 7 per cent to bring its gain for the year so far to a whopping 130 per cent. It’s still riding a wave created by its latest blowout profit report from last week, which calmed some of the worries that Wall Street’s frenzy around artificial-intelligence technology has inflated expectations and prices beyond reasonable levels.
US Cellular climbed 12.2 per cent after T-Mobile said it will buy nearly all of the company.
