Shares in Asia fell on Friday after Wall Street retreated on news that US inflation jumped 7.5 percent last month, raising expectations that the US Federal Reserve would need to move forcefully to cool the economy by increasing interest rates.
The S&P 500 sank 1.9 percent on the report that inflation was the hottest since 1982, while bond yields jumped as traders bet the Fed might have to apply the brakes to the economy with a bigger-than-usual interest rate hike next month.
Ten-year Treasury yields topped 2 percent for the first time since August 2019, Tradeweb said.
Asian economies also are feeling the heat of sharp price increases, with some such as New Zealand already moving to raise interest rates. Others are holding off: Central banks in Thailand, Indonesia and India this week opted to keep their benchmark rates unchanged.
Some countries in the region, such as China and Japan, are contending with higher prices and slow growth, and some are still entangled in COVID-19 outbreaks that are clouding the outlook for their recoveries from the pandemic.
The mild initial reactions to the price data outside the US suggest “markets may want to look towards economic data to guide expectations, considering that we have seen many central banks walked back on their inflation stance,” Yeap Jun Rong, market strategist at IG in Singapore, said in a commentary.
“We will be getting inflation readings out of China next week, which will be one to watch considering its impact on global prices,” he said.
In Taipei, the TAIEX closed down 27.11 points, or 0.15 percent, at 18,310.94. Turnover totaled NT$261.771 billion (US$9.4 billion).
For the week, the TAIEX rose 636.54 points, or 3.6 percent, after a decline of 3.08 percent last month.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index on Friday slipped 0.07 percent to 24,906.66, up 1.36 percent on the week.
The Shanghai Composite Index gave up early gains, sinking 0.66 percent to 3,462.95, but posted a weekly increase of 3.02 percent.
In Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 lost 0.98 percent to 7,217.3, rising 1.36 percent from a week earlier.
Seoul’s KOSPI in lost 0.87 percent to 2,747.71, declining 0.09 percent weekly.
India’s SENSEX dropped 1.31 percent to 58,152.92, losing 0.84 percent from a week earlier.
In Tokyo, markets were closed for the National Foundation Day holiday.
Additional reporting by staff writer, with CNA
‘SWASTICAR’: Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s close association with Donald Trump has prompted opponents to brand him a ‘Nazi’ and resulted in a dramatic drop in sales Demonstrators descended on Tesla Inc dealerships across the US, and in Europe and Canada on Saturday to protest company chief Elon Musk, who has amassed extraordinary power as a top adviser to US President Donald Trump. Waving signs with messages such as “Musk is stealing our money” and “Reclaim our country,” the protests largely took place peacefully following fiery episodes of vandalism on Tesla vehicles, dealerships and other facilities in recent weeks that US officials have denounced as terrorism. Hundreds rallied on Saturday outside the Tesla dealership in Manhattan. Some blasted Musk, the world’s richest man, while others demanded the shuttering of his
ADVERSARIES: The new list includes 11 entities in China and one in Taiwan, which is a local branch of Chinese cloud computing firm Inspur Group The US added dozens of entities to a trade blacklist on Tuesday, the US Department of Commerce said, in part to disrupt Beijing’s artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced computing capabilities. The action affects 80 entities from countries including China, the United Arab Emirates and Iran, with the commerce department citing their “activities contrary to US national security and foreign policy.” Those added to the “entity list” are restricted from obtaining US items and technologies without government authorization. “We will not allow adversaries to exploit American technology to bolster their own militaries and threaten American lives,” US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick said. The entities
Minister of Finance Chuang Tsui-yun (莊翠雲) yesterday told lawmakers that she “would not speculate,” but a “response plan” has been prepared in case Taiwan is targeted by US President Donald Trump’s reciprocal tariffs, which are to be announced on Wednesday next week. The Trump administration, including US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, has said that much of the proposed reciprocal tariffs would focus on the 15 countries that have the highest trade surpluses with the US. Bessent has referred to those countries as the “dirty 15,” but has not named them. Last year, Taiwan’s US$73.9 billion trade surplus with the US
Prices of gasoline and diesel products at domestic gas stations are to fall NT$0.2 and NT$0.1 per liter respectively this week, even though international crude oil prices rose last week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) said yesterday. International crude oil prices continued rising last week, as the US Energy Information Administration reported a larger-than-expected drop in US commercial crude oil inventories, CPC said in a statement. Based on the company’s floating oil price formula, the cost of crude oil rose 2.38 percent last week from a week earlier, it said. News that US President Donald Trump plans a “secondary