Asian stocks fell this week, with the regional benchmark gauge posting the longest weekly slump since February after US stocks tumbled and the majority of Japanese shares traded without dividend rights.
Toyota Motor Corp, the world’s biggest carmaker by market value, lost 1.5 percent in Tokyo, while Fanuc Corp, a Japanese maker of industrial robots, surged 4.1 percent after increasing its annual profit forecast. In Jakarta, PT Bank Mandiri declined 4.3 percent after Indonesia’s parliament passed a law scrapping direct local elections, ending a decade-long system of regional democracy.
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index lost 1 percent to 142.11 as of 7:34pm in Hong Kong on Friday, falling to an almost four-month low and extending this week’s retreat to 1.7 percent.
More than US$1.4 trillion has been wiped from the value of global shares this month amid concern Chinese economic growth is slowing and that the US Federal Reserve may increase interest rates sooner than some investors are expecting.
“You’re going to have these little setbacks,” Brian Jacobsen, chief portfolio strategist at Wells Fargo Advantage Funds in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin, told Bloomberg TV. “You are going to see some of this flight to safety. In this environment expect a little bit higher volatility, so you’re probably just going to have to hold your breath and ride it out. I would stay the course, overweighting riskier assets.”
In Taipei, the TAIEX lost 0.24 percent, or 21.77 points, to close on 8,989.82, compared with 9,240.45 on Sept. 19.
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) fell 2.9 percent to NT$97.1 in the final session, while Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電) dropped 0.82 percent to NT$121.
In Tokyo, the TOPIX slid 1.1 percent with more than 1,000 companies from Toyota to Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc trading without the right to their latest dividend.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index fell 0.4 percent and China’s Shanghai Composite Index reversed morning losses to add 0.1 percent.
Analysts said the losses could be partially blamed on profit-taking at the end of the quarter after a recent uptrend, while investors contemplate a weak outlook for China and Japan and the likelihood of higher US interest rates from next year.
The Hang Seng China AH Premium Index climbed to 98.09, signaling the smallest discount on Shanghai shares relative to their Hong Kong counterparts since a link between the two’s exchanges was announced five months ago.
Indonesia’s Jakarta Stock Exchange Composite Index tumbled 1.7 percent, on course for its biggest fall in four months. The vote is a setback to incoming Indonesian president Joko Widodo, as he and the political parties supporting him had opposed it.
The bill was sponsored by the “Red and White” coalition of losing candidate Prabowo Subianto.
Elsewhere in Asia, Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 Index fell 1.3 percent, South Korea’s KOSPI shed 0.1 percent, Singapore’s Straits Times Index was little changed and New Zealand’s NZX 50 Index lost 0.5 percent.
In other markets on Friday:
Mumbai gained 0.60 percent, or 157.96 points, from Thursday to end the week at 26,626.32.
Manila closed 0.45 percent lower, slipping 32.91 points to 7,261.30.
Wellington shed 0.46 percent, or 24.37 points, to 5,253.49.
ISSUES: Gogoro has been struggling with ballooning losses and was recently embroiled in alleged subsidy fraud, using Chinese-made components instead of locally made parts Gogoro Inc (睿能創意), the nation’s biggest electric scooter maker, yesterday said that its chairman and CEO Horace Luke (陸學森) has resigned amid chronic losses and probes into the company’s alleged involvement in subsidy fraud. The board of directors nominated Reuntex Group (潤泰集團) general counsel Tamon Tseng (曾夢達) as the company’s new chairman, Gogoro said in a statement. Ruentex is Gogoro’s biggest stakeholder. Gogoro Taiwan general manager Henry Chiang (姜家煒) is to serve as acting CEO during the interim period, the statement said. Luke’s departure came as a bombshell yesterday. As a company founder, he has played a key role in pushing for the
China has claimed a breakthrough in developing homegrown chipmaking equipment, an important step in overcoming US sanctions designed to thwart Beijing’s semiconductor goals. State-linked organizations are advised to use a new laser-based immersion lithography machine with a resolution of 65 nanometers or better, the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said in an announcement this month. Although the note does not specify the supplier, the spec marks a significant step up from the previous most advanced indigenous equipment — developed by Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment Group Co (SMEE, 上海微電子) — which stood at about 90 nanometers. MIIT’s claimed advances last
CROSS-STRAIT TENSIONS: The US company could switch orders from TSMC to alternative suppliers, but that would lower chip quality, CEO Jensen Huang said Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳), whose products have become the hottest commodity in the technology world, on Wednesday said that the scramble for a limited amount of supply has frustrated some customers and raised tensions. “The demand on it is so great, and everyone wants to be first and everyone wants to be most,” he told the audience at a Goldman Sachs Group Inc technology conference in San Francisco. “We probably have more emotional customers today. Deservedly so. It’s tense. We’re trying to do the best we can.” Huang’s company is experiencing strong demand for its latest generation of chips, called
GLOBAL ECONOMY: Policymakers have a choice of a small 25 basis-point cut or a bold cut of 50 basis points, which would help the labor market, but might reignite inflation The US Federal Reserve is gearing up to announce its first interest rate cut in more than four years on Wednesday, with policymakers expected to debate how big a move to make less than two months before the US presidential election. Senior officials at the US central bank including Fed Chairman Jerome Powell have in recent weeks indicated that a rate cut is coming this month, as inflation eases toward the bank’s long-term target of two percent, and the labor market continues to cool. The Fed, which has a dual mandate from the US Congress to act independently to ensure