Asia higher as investors bargain hunt Tuesday Sep 1

Investors picked up bargains yesterday Sep 1, lifting Asian shares a day after heavy selling was triggered by fears of tighter liquidity in the Chinese economy that could stymie regional recovery.

Markets were also buoyed by data showing manufacturing in China had grown for an eighth straight month. However, dealers will be looking ahead to key US economic data.

TOKYO: Up 0.36 percent. The Nikkei-225 gained 37.53 points to 10,530.06.
“Recent positive economic data haven’t lifted Wall Street much, so we can’t expect much near-term upside for Japan equities,” Mizuho Securities senior technical analyst Yutaka Miura told Dow Jones Newswires.

SYDNEY: Up 0.79 percent. The S&P/ASX200 rose 35.5 points to 4,514.6.
IG Markets analyst Ben Potter said banks, resources and consumer staples such as retailers drove the market’s gains.

SHANGHAI: Up 0.60 percent. The composite index rose 15.98 points to 2,683.72.
The market bounced after losing 6.74 percent on Monday – its biggest single-day percentage drop since June 10 last year.

HONG KONG: Share prices closed 0.75 percent higher yesterday after China’s market stabilised following heavy losses the previous day.
The Hang Seng Index finished 148.11 points up at 19,872.30.
Analysts are still unsure on whether the index has hit bottom since falling from its year-to-date closing high of 21,074.21 on August 11, adding that the market will find resistance at 20,000 due to the volatility in China.

SINGAPORE: Shares closed slightly higher yesterday on subdued sentiment following the previous day’s heavy losses in the Chinese market, dealers said.
The Straits Times Index rose 3.49 points or 0.13 percent to 2,596.39.
A dealer with a foreign brokerage expects any gains in coming sessions to be modest.

SEOUL: Up 1.96 percent. The Kospi ended up 31.21 points at 1,623.06.
The market was led by strong gains in large-cap information technology and auto stocks on hopes for good future performances.

TAIPEI: Up 2.84 percent. The weighted index rose 193.80 points to 7,019.75.
“Investor concerns seemed to have eased after the government tried to control the damage (the Dalai Lama’s visit) may bring,” Mars Hsu of Grand Cathay Securities said.

KUALA LUMPUR: Share prices on Bursa Malaysia continued to stage their follow-through consolidations yesterday. Overall declining counters outpaced advancing counters by 448 to 171.
The FTSE Bursa Malaysia Composite Index (FBM KLCI) fell from its intra-day high of 1,174.27 points to its intra-day low of 1,163.78 yesterday. It closed at 1,171.28 points, giving a day-on-day gain of 2.99 points, or 0.25 percent.

BANGKOK: Up 0.13 percent. The composite index gained 0.87 points to close at 654.12, and the blue-chip SET-50 index was up 0.25 points to 467.52.
Thanomsak Saharatchai, an analyst from Capital Nomura Securities, said the market was likely to swing narrowly in the next couple days as there were no outstanding factors expected to affect trading.

JAKARTA: Down 0.62 percent. The composite index fell 14.62 points to 2,326.91.
“Profit taking continues on the local bourse despite a recovery in many Asian markets,” a trader told Dow Jones Newswires.

MANILA: Down 1.08 percent. The composite index lost 31.25 points to 2,852.93 while the all share index fell 13.98 points to 1,816.20.
Investors, returning after Monday’s public holiday, caught up with the downturn in overseas markets, dealers said.

MUMBAI: Down 0.74 percent. The 30-share Sensex fell 115.45 points to 15,551.19.

VIETNAM: The VN Index seemed to halt its rising impetus and end at 547.69 points, up 0.91 point or 0.17 percent. It was recorded as the highest level of VN Index in the past one year. Last year, on Sep 05, VN Index had sharply decreased from 558.56 points to 546.66 points.
The HNX Index witnessed the third increasing session when ending at 172.2 points, up 0.03 point or 0.02 percent with a total market trade of about 39.637 million units or more than 1.406 trillion dong in value.

EUROPE: European shares posted their biggest one-day percentage fall in two weeks yesterday, led by banks and commodity stocks, but analysts said the market was likely to resume its climb after a period of consolidation.

The FTSEurofirst 300 index of top European shares ended 1.8 percent down at 954.15 points, the lowest closing level since August 20. Financial stocks took the most points off the index,

Around Europe, the UK’s FTSE 100 index, Germany’s DAX and France’s CAC 40 fell 1.8 to 2.5 percent.

AMERICA: A stock market ripe for a big pullback succumbed Tuesday, plunging when rumors of a bank failure revived investors’ anxiety about the banking industry and the economy as a whole.

A batch of economic reports that just weren’t good enough added to the mix as the major indexes all fell about 2 percent and the Dow Jones industrials slid 185 points. Treasury prices, usually the beneficiary of a slide in stocks, ended only moderately higher.

A break in the market’s six-month rally was widely expected after investors showed a growing inclination to sell for some time. While the major indexes finished August with respectable gains, including a 3.4 percent rise in the Standard & Poor’s 500, trading was erratic and the advances had a half-hearted feeling. Analysts warned that investors were doubting whether they should have bid stocks so high in the rally that began in early March.

The Dow dropped 185.68, or 2 percent, to 9,310.60. The index is down 270 points, or 2.8 percent, since Friday, its biggest drop over three days since July 7, when it lost 341 points.

The S&P 500 fell 22.58, or 2.2 percent, to 998.04, while the Nasdaq composite index fell 40.17, or 2 percent, to 1,968.89.

In other trading, the Russell 2000 index of smaller companies fell 14.01, or 2.5 percent, to 558.06.

Benchmark Currency Rates
	USD	EUR	JPY	GBP	CHF	CAD	AUD	HKD
HKD	7.751	11.0165	0.0834	12.5233	7.2687	7.0282	6.4376
AUD	1.204	1.7113	0.013	1.9453	1.1291	1.0917	 	0.1553
CAD	1.1028	1.5675	0.0119	1.7819	1.0342	 	0.916	0.1423
CHF	1.0664	1.5156	0.0115	1.7229	 	0.9669	0.8857	0.1376
GBP	0.6189	0.8797	0.0067	 	0.5804	0.5612	0.514	0.0799
JPY	92.887	132.0203	150.077	87.1074	84.2245	77.1473	11.9839
EUR	0.7036	 	0.0076	1.1368	0.6598	0.638	0.5844	0.0908
USD	 	1.4213	0.0108	1.6157	0.9378	0.9067	0.8306	0.129
                                                              Bloomberg

 

Category: Stocks