· Stocks find fleeting relief in Evergrande deal; Fed looms
Markets in mainland China fell more than 1% on Wednesday’s open before bouncing back slightly amid the ongoing Evergrande crisis, as markets reopened for trade after a two-day holiday.
With global markets selling off earlier this week, investors kept a close watch on the China markets for any fallout surrounding the embattled developer.
Both the Shanghai composite and Shenzhen component dropped more than 1% in early trade, before easing off on some of those losses. The Shanghai composite shed all earlier losses and was last trading 0.23% higher in the afternoon while the Shenzhen component slipped 0.354%.
Markets in Hong Kong were closed for a holiday. On Monday, the Hang Seng had plunged more than 3% before paring some losses on Tuesday.
That weighed on MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan, which fell 0.3%, however, Australia was higher.
Other Asia-Pacific markets
Elsewhere in Asia, the Nikkei 225 in Japan slipped 0.39% while the Topix index shed 0.73%.
The Taiex in Taiwan dropped 2.06%. In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 edged 0.7% higher. South Korea was closed for a holiday.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan traded 0.26% lower.
The pan-European Stoxx 600 index opened 0.8% higher with all sectors in positive territory.
Top of the agenda for investors on Wednesday is the conclusion of the U.S. Federal Reserve’s highly anticipated September meeting with investors looking out for any indications about the Fed’s tapering of its easy monetary policy.
The Fed will release a policy statement with economic and interest rate forecasts, then Chairman Jerome Powell is expected to speak to the media at 2:30 p.m. ET. Powell has said previously that tapering could occur this year, but investors are waiting for more details, particularly after mixed economic data released since Powell’s last comments.
Key data releases also on the agenda for Europe include flash consumer confidence data for the euro zone in September, Italian industrial sales figures for July and Dutch consumer spending numbers for July. There are no major earnings releases Wednesday.
Reference: Reuters, CNBC
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