Stocks across the Asia-Pacific region rose after a tough day on Wall Street, where US tech stocks plunged due to rising inflation expectations.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index jumped 2.1% on Tuesday, boosted by a 3.6% gain for HSBC after the Asian-focused lender said it would resume paying dividends. Australia’s S & P / ASX 200 added 0.8 percent.
In cryptocurrencies, bitcoin has continued its decline since the most recent records.
China’s CSI 300 index of stocks listed in Shanghai and Shenzhen fell 0.1% a day after the benchmark suffered its biggest one-day drop in more than six months. The liquidation was driven by concerns that the country’s rapid economic recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic could result in the removal of political support for asset prices.
Meanwhile, South Korea’s Kospi technology-focused index rose 0.4 percent. The markets in Japan were closed due to a national holiday.
In U.S. trading on Monday, the S&P 500 fell 0.8 percent, while the technology-focused Nasdaq Composite fell 2.5 percent. Shares in Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Netflix and Alphabet, Google’s parent company, fell in what some investors suggested was the start of a delayed correction.
S&P 500 futures were up 0.5 percent on Tuesday during the Asian trading session, while London’s FTSE 100 futures were up 0.3 percent.
The liquidation of US government bonds accelerated on Monday, fearing that returns would be eroded by a return to inflation. The US Treasury’s 10-year yield rose 0.03 percentage points to 1.37 percent. Bond yields move inversely to prices.
Trading on U.S. treasury bills will not resume until European markets are reopened due to the holiday in Japan.
Investors are also eager for Federal Reserve Chairman Jay Powell’s testimony to Congressional committees on Wednesday for any clues as to whether rising inflation could lead the U.S. central bank to restrict its ultra-peripheral monetary policy.
Traders will have another clue as to whether inflation concerns are justified on Friday, when the U.S. Department of Commerce will release its personal consumer spending price index for January.
“The reality today is that inflation is a risk – yields on government bonds are rising as markets reprecise for better future growth,” said Kerry Craig, global market strategist at JPMorgan Asset Management. “But a little inflation may not be bad, and the recovery still has a long way to go before it becomes a problem.”
Bitcoin fell 9.6% to $ 49,872 for a single currency on Tuesday, after reaching a record high of $ 58,500 the previous day. The cryptocurrency is still more than 70 percent this year.
Oil prices continued to rise with Brent oil, the global benchmark, rising 1.8% to $ 66.43 a barrel. The West Texas Intermediate rose 1.6 percent to $ 62.71 a barrel.