SINGAPORE — Hong Kong property shares dragged the market lower as the Asia-Pacific region traded mixed on Wednesday. Inflation rose in Australia and investors eagerly awaited the Fed’s policy decision.
Shares in property firm Country Garden fell about 14 percent on Wednesday after it said it would raise HK$2.8 billion ($360 million) by selling 870 million new shares.
Shares were priced at HK$3.25, about a 12.63% discount to Country Garden’s close on Tuesday.
The Hang Seng Mainland Properties Index was 5.55% lower.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index fell 1.51% and the Hang Seng Tech Index fell 1.65%. Heavyweight Alibaba fell 3.83 percent after emerging on Tuesday after announcing plans for a dual initial public offering in Hong Kong.
Elsewhere in Asia, Japan’s Nikkei 225 gained 0.18 percent, while the Topix index was slightly higher.
Markets in mainland China were slightly lower. The Shanghai Composite fell about 0.1 percent and the Shenzhen Component lost 0.19 percent.
In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 hovered around the flat line following the inflation report.
We expect any impact on the AUD from today’s CPI to be short-lived as a darkening global outlook will weigh more heavily on the AUD.
Christina Clifton
Economist, Commonwealth Bank of Australia
South Korea’s Kospi lost 0.48%, but the Kosdaq advanced 0.38%.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was 0.75 percent lower.
Australia CPI
Prices in Australia rose 6.1% in the second quarter compared to the same period last year, up from 5.1% in the first quarter of the year. Economists polled by Reuters noted that inflation reached 6.2%.
Christina Clifton, an economist at the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, wrote in a note ahead of the announcement that the value of the CPI Down Under could affect market expectations for future rate hikes.
“We expect any impact on the AUD from today’s CPI to be short-lived as the darkening global outlook will weigh more heavily on the AUD,” she wrote.
On Tuesday, the International Monetary Fund cut its forecasts for global GDP for 2022 and 2023. It now expects growth to reach 3.2 percent this year, down 0.4 percentage points from its April forecast.
The Australian dollar eased to $0.6926 after accounting for the impact of inflation.
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US stocks fell overnight after Walmart cut its profit forecast.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 228.50 points, or 0.71%, to 31,761.54. The S&P 500 fell 1.15 percent to 3,921.05, while the Nasdaq Composite fell about 1.87 percent to 11,562.57.
The Federal Open Market Committee began meeting Tuesday in the state and will continue on Wednesday.
Expectations for a 75 basis point move were 75.1%, according to CME Group’s FedWatch Tool.
In corporate news, chip maker SK Hynix reported a 56% jump in operating profit to 4.2 trillion Korean won ($3.2 billion) in the second quarter of 2022 from a year ago. Revenue jumped 34 percent to 13.8 trillion won, helped by “the continued appreciation of the U.S. dollar,” the company said in a statement.
But SK Hynix predicted that memory demand will slow in the second half of the year as PC and smartphone shipments are expected to be lower than initial forecasts.
The company’s shares were last down 1.69%.
Car maker Mitsubishi Motors and miner Rio Tinto are also poised to post profits.
Currencies and oil
The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of peers, was at 107.018, higher than Tuesday’s levels.
The Japanese yen weakened to 136.96 per dollar.
U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures were 0.23 percent higher at $95.20 a barrel, while Brent crude futures were unchanged at $104.40 a barrel.
— CNBC’s Tanaya Machill, Sarah Min and Karen Gilchrist contributed to this report.
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