People walk past the Bank of Japan (BoJ) headquarters in Tokyo on October 30, 2024. (Photo by Yuichi YAMAZAKI / AFP)
TOKYO — Asian shares mostly declined Thursday as investors grappled with uncertainty ahead of the United States presidential election on Nov. 5.
Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 dipped 0.5% in early trading to 39,069.20. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 slipped 0.3% to 8,153.20. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 0.3% to 20,433.83, while the Shanghai Composite fell 0.3% to 3,258.04.
South Korea’s Kospi dropped 1.2% to 2,562.07, after the South Korean government reported North Korea’s test-launch of what’s suspected to be new long-range missile designed to strike the continental U.S.
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Details of the long-range missile capabilities North Korea was testing were not yet known, but the launch was likely meant to grab America’s attention ahead of the U.S. election Tuesday.
Market watchers were also awaiting a monetary policy decision from the Bank of Japan, although analysts expect the central bank to stay pat.
Upcoming earnings releases in Asia, as well as the rest of the world, also added to the wait-and-see mood.
On Wall Street, the S&P 500 slipped 0.3% to 5,813.67 after drifting between small gains and losses several times, though it’s still near its all-time high set earlier in October.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average edged down 0.2% to 42,141.54, while the Nasdaq composite slipped 0.6% to 18,607.93, from its own record set the day before.
Alphabet climbed 2.8% after beating analysts’ forecasts for profit in the latest quarter, thanks largely to the performance of its Google business. It’s the latest of the highly influential group of stocks known as the “Magnificent Seven” to top high expectations for growth.
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Computer chip companies have been some of the biggest winners of the artificial intelligence rush, but Advanced Micro Devices helped drag down stocks across the industry after reporting profit for the latest quarter that only matched analysts’ expectations.
Nvidia, a chip giant that’s rocketed to become one of Wall Street’s largest most influential stocks, fell 1.4% and was one of the heaviest weights on the S&P 500.
One of the few stocks to hurt the index nearly as much was Eli Lilly, which sank 6.3% amid concerns about two of the drug maker’s blockbuster products: diabetes treatment Mounjaro and weight loss counterpart Zepbound.
Also falling was Trump Media & Technology Group, the company behind former Donald Trump’s Truth Social platform. It dropped 22.3% for the worst loss since taking its place on the Nasdaq stock market following a merger with another company in March. The stock is notoriously volatile, and it had been rallying strongly over the past month, up to $40 from roughly $12.
In the bond market, yields edged higher following the latest readings on the U.S. economy. Growth for the overall economy slowed during the summer from the spring, according to a preliminary estimate by the U.S. government. But the performance was slightly better than economists expected.
A report Wednesday suggested employers outside the government accelerated their hiring in October, when economists were forecasting a slowdown. It could raise optimism for Friday’s more comprehensive jobs report coming from the U.S. government.
A slowing economy is no surprise after the Federal Reserve hiked interest rates sharply in hopes of braking enough on the economy to get inflation under control. The question is whether the Fed can help keep the economy out of a recession, now that it’s begun cutting interest rates to keep the job market humming.
Traders are largely expecting the Fed to cut its federal funds rate by a quarter of a percentage point at its next meeting next week, according to data from CME Group.
The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.28% from 4.26% late Tuesday and just 3.60% in the middle of September.
In energy trading, benchmark U.S. crude rose 21 cents to $68.82 a barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, added 33 cents to $72.88 a barrel.
In currency trading, the U.S. dollar edged up to 153.48 Japanese yen from 153.31 yen. The euro cost $1.0853, inching down from $1.0858.