Asian stocks on Friday followed Wall Street lower as fears spread that US interest rate hikes to fight inflation might stall economic growth.
Investors are worried whether the US Federal Reserve, which raised its key interest rate by half a percentage point on Wednesday, can cool inflation without tipping the US economy into recession. Traders were briefly encouraged by Fed chairman Jerome Powell’s comment that the Fed was not considering even bigger increases.
“Clearly, investors had second thoughts about the so-called ‘dovish hike’ from the Fed,” Rob Carnell, head of Asia-Pacific research at ING, wrote in a report.
The likelihood is “rate hikes coming thick and fast, but little if any prospect of a turn in inflation any time soon,” he wrote.
In Taiwan, the TAIEX dropped 287.92 points, or 1.72 percent, to 16,408.20. The index lost 1.11 percent over the week to post its second straight week of declines.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng plunged 3.81 percent to 20,001.96, down 5.16 percent on the week, while the Shanghai Composite Index fell 2.16 percent to 3,001.56, declining 1.49 percent weekly.
In Seoul, the KOSPI tumbled 1.23 percent to 2,644.51 and lost 0.86 percent on the week.
Sydney’s S&P/ASX 200 lurched down 2.16 percent to 7,205.6, dropping 3.09 percent from a week earlier, while India’s SENSEX closed down 1.56 percent at 54,835.58, posting a weekly decline of 3.90 percent.
Japan bucked the trend as trading resumed after a holiday, with the Nikkei 225 increasing 0.69 percent to 27,003.56, up 1.14 from a week earlier, and the broader TOPIX rising 0.93 percent to 1,915.91 — a weekly gain of 1.99 percent.
Additional reporting by staff writer, with CNA
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday said its materials management head, Vanessa Lee (李文如), had tendered her resignation for personal reasons. The personnel adjustment takes effect tomorrow, TSMC said in a statement. The latest development came one month after Lee reportedly took leave from the middle of last month. Cliff Hou (侯永清), senior vice president and deputy cochief operating officer, is to concurrently take on the role of head of the materials management division, which has been under his supervision, TSMC said. Lee, who joined TSMC in 2022, was appointed senior director of materials management and
Gudeng Precision Industrial Co (家登精密), the sole extreme ultraviolet pod supplier to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電), yesterday said it has trimmed its revenue growth target for this year as US tariffs are likely to depress customer demand and weigh on the whole supply chain. Gudeng’s remarks came after the US on Monday notified 14 countries, including Japan and South Korea, of new tariff rates that are set to take effect on Aug. 1. Taiwan is still negotiating for a rate lower than the 32 percent “reciprocal” tariffs announced by the US in April, which it later postponed to today. The
MAJOR CONTRIBUTOR: Revenue from AI servers made up more than 50 percent of Wistron’s total server revenue in the second quarter, the company said Wistron Corp (緯創) on Tuesday reported a 135.6 percent year-on-year surge in revenue for last month, driven by strong demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers, with the momentum expected to extend into the third quarter. Revenue last month reached NT$209.18 billion (US$7.2 billion), a record high for June, bringing second-quarter revenue to NT$551.29 billion, a 129.47 percent annual increase, the company said. Revenue in the first half of the year totaled NT$897.77 billion, up 87.36 percent from a year earlier and also a record high for the period, it said. The company remains cautiously optimistic about AI server shipments in the third quarter,
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) on Thursday met with US President Donald Trump at the White House, days before a planned trip to China by the head of the world’s most valuable chipmaker, people familiar with the matter said. Details of what the two men discussed were not immediately available, and the people familiar with the meeting declined to elaborate on the agenda. Spokespeople for the White House had no immediate comment. Nvidia declined to comment. Nvidia’s CEO has been vocal about the need for US companies to access the world’s largest semiconductor market and is a frequent visitor to China.
RSS