The World’s busiest pedestrian crossing
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Asia-Pacific markets fell Thursday, extending their declines after a sell-off in the previous session, with Japan’s Nikkei 225 leading losses in the region.
The Nikkei fell 1.15%, while the broad-based Topix was down 0.58%, after the release of Japan’s July wage data.
Average monthly cash earnings in the country rose 3.6% year-on-year, a softer rise compared to the 4.5% climb seen in June.
Real wages climbed 0.4% year on year, rising for a second straight month after a 1.1% rise in June.
The strong pay report offers the Bank of Japan more room for a rate hike, which could put pressure on equities. Bank of Japan board member Hajime Takata said the central bank “must keep raising rates if it can confirm that companies will continue to increase spending and wages,” Reuters reported.
Other economic data coming from the region include retail sales numbers from Singapore.
Separately, Australian telecom operator Optus has received the green light from the country’s Competition and Consumer Commission for its proposed regional network and spectrum sharing agreement with rival TPG Telecom.
Optus, which is owned by Singapore’s Singtel, announced the agreement in April, after having lobbied against a similar merger between TPG and Telstra, Australia’s largest telco.
The Hang Seng index fell 0.61%, while mainland China’s CSI 300 was marginally down.
Shares of some Chinese developers inched higher on optimism that the country was reportedly considering a two-phase reduction in interest rates to shore up its embattled property sector. Hong Kong-listed China Vanke rose 1.5%, while Logan Group added 1.32%.
On Wednesday, China’s financial regulators proposed a reduction in interest rates of up to $5.3 trillion worth on outstanding mortgages to decrease borrowing costs for millions, while easing pressure on its banking sector, Bloomberg reported, citing sources familiar with the matter.
South Korea’s Kospi fell 0.15%, while the small cap Kosdaq was 0.73% lower. Shares of SK Hynix rose 3.36%. The South Korean chipmaker is set to start mass producing HBM3E 12-layer chips by the end of September, the company’s president and head of AI Infra division reportedly said on Wednesday.
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 was the outlier, climbing 0.3%. Exports from the country in July rose 0.7% month on month while imports slipped 0.8% compared to last month.