Asia-Pacific markets mostly fell on Monday after Wall Street had its worst session of the year last Friday. U.S. economic data pointed to a slowing economy and sticky inflation. China’s CSI300 index fell 0.22% to close at 3,969.72.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index ended the day 0.58% lower at 23,341.61. Indian stocks continued to be in negative territory, with the Nifty down 1.08% and the BSE Sensex index losing 1.03%. South Korea’s KOSPI ended the day 0.35% lower at 2,645.27.
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 ended the day 0.14% higher at 7,308.20, breaking its five-session losing streak. Japanese markets were closed for a public holiday.
Asia-Pacific markets decline amid Wall Street slide
Singapore’s core inflation edged up 0.8% year on year in January, marking the lowest reading since June 2021. Headline inflation came in at 1.2% year on year, its lowest since February 2021. In the U.S., the Dow lost 748.63 points, or 1.69%, to close at 31,428.02.
The S&P 500 slid 1.71% to end at 6,013.13. The Nasdaq dropped 2.2%, settling at 19,524.01. Shares in agri-business company Olam Group surged as much as 8.85% after it announced it will sell its remaining 64.57% stake in Olam Agri to Saudi Agriculture & Livestock Investment (Salic).
Australia’s Perpetual saw its shares slide 3.62% Monday as it terminated talks with KKR on the sale of its wealth management arm and corporate trust units, worth 2.2 billion Australian dollars. Trading in 30-day fed funds futures contracts Friday now suggests roughly 55% odds that the Federal Reserve will cut rates two to three times by the end of the year. The odds on Thursday stood at about 44.4%.