BANGKOK (AP) — Stocks fell in most Asian markets Thursday ahead of a major U.S. inflation report due Friday that could point the way for interest rates.
Benchmarks fell more than 1% in Tokyo, Hong Kong and Sydney. Oil prices and US futures also fell.
The markets’ big focus this week is on the US government’s inflation report due out on Friday. The personal consumption expenditures (PCE) index is the Federal Reserve’s preferred inflation measure, and analysts said investors were in a wait-and-see mode after the recent mixed data.
The latest inflation updates could influence the central bank’s decision on when to start cutting interest rates, which remain at their highest level in more than two decades and are having an impact globally.
In Asian trading, another set of measures to stimulate the Chinese property market failed to improve market sentiment. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 2% to 17,733.76, while Shanghai’s composite index fell 0.6% to 2,955.13.
The latest move to revive the real estate sector came from Beijing, one of China’s largest cities, when Chinese capital cut minimum down payment ratios and mortgage rates from Thursday.
Other Chinese cities have taken similar measures, in line with a national policy aimed at luring buyers back into a market that has languished since a government crackdown on excessive lending by developers left dozens of such firms unable to service their debts and the downturn has dragged down the world’s second-largest economy.
In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 index fell 0.8% to 39,341.54 on concerns about further weakness in the Japanese yen.
The US dollar was trading at 160.35 yen early on Thursday, after breaking through the 160 level a day earlier to its lowest level since 1986. Japanese officials have warned they may intervene in the market to counter the trend , which has both positive and negative consequences for the economy. the economy.
Elsewhere in Asia, Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.3% to 7,759.60. Taiwan’s Taiex lost 0.4% and Bangkok’s SET fell 0.7%. Shares rose in Mumbai, Jakarta and Singapore.
A mostly subdued trading day on Wednesday left Wall Street benchmarks close to last week’s record highs.
The S&P 500 index rose 0.2% to 5,477.90 after swinging between small gains and losses for most of the day. About 65% of the stocks in the benchmark index fell.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished less than 0.1% higher at 39,127.80, while the Nasdaq index rose 0.5% to 17,805.16.
Several major stocks helped offset the broader S&P 500 decline.
Amazon.com rose 3.9%, surpassing $2 trillion in market value for the first time. The increase comes just days after Nvidia topped $3 trillion and briefly became the most valuable company on Wall Street.
FedEx helped offset the losses with a 15.5% gain. The parcel carrier reported results for the last quarter that largely exceeded expectations. Rivian rose 23.2% after Volkswagen said it would invest up to $5 billion in the struggling electric vehicle maker.
Apple rose 2% and Microsoft gained 0.3%. Their large values tend to strongly influence the direction of the market.
Investors hope the Federal Reserve will soon cut interest rates, but the effort to return inflation to the 2% target has proven difficult. Wall Street is betting on a rate cut at the central bank meeting in September.
The economy has remained relatively strong despite inflation and high borrowing costs for consumers and businesses, but is slowing. Wall Street is hoping the Fed can time its rate cuts to ease pressure on the economy before it slows too much, while staying close to its goal of cooling inflation.
In other trades, U.S. benchmark crude lost 11 cents to $80.79 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Brent crude, the international standard, lost 9 cents to $84.38 a barrel.
The euro rose from $1.0681 to $1.0696.
