Asian stocks fell, capping a weekly decline, as a stronger yen weighed on Japanese shares and investors waited for a US jobs report to assess its implications for monetary policy.
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index dropped 0.5 percent to 128.25, taking its loss since the beginning of the month to 1.1 percent, as concern over the fallout from the UK’s vote to leave the EU returned, boosting haven assets such as Japan’s currency. Energy shares declined as crude fell to the lowest in almost two months on renewed fears of oversupply.
Taiwan shut financial markets on Friday as Typhoon Nepartak hit the nation’s eastern coast, killing at least three people and forcing thousands to evacuate. The TAIEX closed up 0.8 percent on Thursday at 8,640.91. It was down 1.1 percent from 8,738.24 on Friday last week.
Japan’s TOPIX reversed gains on Friday to fall 1.3 percent, extending its weekly decline to 3.6 percent. The TOPIX is down 22 percent this year, in line with the yen’s 19 percent surge against the US dollar.
Pressure is building on the Bank of Japan to respond, Nicholas Smith, a Tokyo-based strategist at CLSA Ltd, told Bloomberg TV.
“The main problem for Japanese equities at this stage is earnings growth and that’s negatively impacted by the strength we’ve seen in the yen,” Adrian Zuercher, head of Asia asset allocation at the private banking arm of UBS AG, told Bloomberg TV in Hong Kong. “As long as we move forward at these levels with the yen, we still have headwinds in terms of earnings. The UK referendum has ushered in a period of heightened uncertainty.”
Japanese voters head to the polls today for an upper-house election that Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has billed as a gauge of backing for his economic policies. Voting starts at 7am and closes at 8pm, with official results trickling out later in the evening.
“Global risk appetite is absolutely in the tank at the moment,” Smith said. “There’s very little they can do to weaken the yen further. We’ve had our nasty shock from Brexit and one would assume that the effect of the Brexit scare is going to lessen over time, but I wouldn’t put a lot of hope in the yen weakening much from here.”
Nintendo surged 8.9 percent, the largest increase on the Asia Pacific index, after the firm’s new mobile-game app, Pokemon Go, climbed to the top of the free-to-use charts for Apple Inc in the US and Australia. Asahi Glass Co slumped 8.2 percent after a report in the Nikkei Shimbun that the company’s first-half sales would be about ¥630 billion (US$6.3 billion).
Political gridlock in Australia is dragging on with ballot papers still being counted. Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull’s Liberal-National coalition is increasingly confident it won last weekend’s election as vote counting indicates it has pulled ahead of the opposition Labor party. The S&P/ASX 200 Index closed up 0.1 percent on Friday.
Singapore’s Straits Times Index fell 0.6 percent, as did South Korea’s KOSPI. New Zealand’s S&P/NZX 50 Index retreated 0.1 percent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index slid 0.7 percent and the Shanghai Composite Index lost 1 percent.
E-mini futures on the S&P 500 Index rose 0.2 percent, after the underlying equity measure slipped 0.1 percent on Thursday, led by energy shares.
It has been a turbulent year for investors in the Asia-Pacific region. The regional index began the year with a 14 percent slump through a February low on concern about a slowdown in China and the falling price of oil, and amid prospects for a US rate rise. The measure then rallied 19 percent through this year’s peak in April before retreating again. It is down 2.9 percent this year.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last