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TOKYO – Asian stocks were down on Wednesday as global markets cautiously awaited the US central bank’s latest comments on the economic outlook.
The Japanese reference Nikkei 225 NIK,
dropped early gains and slipped 0.2% while South Korea’s Kospi 180721,
decreased by 1%. Australian S & P / ASX 200 XJO,
dipped 0.7%. Hang Seng HSI from Hong Kong,
fell 0.2%, while the Shanghai Composite SHCOMP,
fell 0.4%. Singapore STI benchmarks,
Taiwan Y9999,
and Indonesia JAKIDX,
slipped too.
Investors are awaiting the latest economic and interest rate projections from the Federal Reserve, due later today. Economists expect Fed Chairman Jerome Powell to try to convince nervous financial markets that the central bank can continue to provide support without triggering inflation to rise.
These concerns have recently pushed bond yields higher, undermining demand to buy stocks.
The Fed meeting “has the potential to allay or exacerbate some of the recent market concerns about soaring bond yields,” said Jingyi Pan, senior market strategist at IG in Singapore.
Wall Street capped off a choppy trading day with indexes mostly closing lower. Losses by banks, industrials and businesses that rely on consumer spending, including cruise line operators, have outpaced gains in stocks in major tech and communications services.
The S&P 500 SPX,
fell 0.2% to 3,962.71. The Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA,
lost 0.4% to 32,825.95. The Nasdaq COMP,
resisted the trend, benefiting from the rebound in tech stocks and up 0.1% to 13,471.57.
Investors weighed in on new economic data Tuesday that showed Americans slashed spending last month, partly due to bad weather in large areas of the country that kept shoppers away from stores, and partly because of the exhaustion of stimulus payments for December and January.
“We are still in the process of getting back to a more normal environment,” said Jason Pride, director of private banking investments at Glenmede. “Given the lump sum nature of the government’s stimulus payments, we’re going to see the numbers jump.”
In energy trading, the American benchmark CLJ21,
fell 9 cents to $ 64.71 a barrel for electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. He lost 59 cents to $ 64.80 on Tuesday. Brent BRNK21 raw,
the international standard, lost 15 cents to $ 68.24 a barrel.
In currency trading, the US dollar USDJPY,
rose to 109.12 Japanese yen from 108.99 yen.
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