A line of trucks parked outside a shipping terminal in Yokohama, Japan, on Monday, Dec. 4, 2023.
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Asia-Pacific markets were set to mostly fall Friday, mirroring moves on Wall Street that was weighed down by a hotter-than-expected producer price inflation reading.
The producer price index, which measures wholesale inflation, climbed 0.4% for November, higher than the Dow Jones estimate of 0.2%. On an annual basis, PPI advanced 3%, its biggest rise since the 12 months ended February 2023.
In Asia, investors await the Bank of Japan’s tankan survey, which tracks business sentiment in the country among large companies and contributes to the BOJ’s considerations when forming monetary policy.
India will also release its wholesale inflation figures for November later in the day. Economists polled by Reuters expect India’s wholesale inflation rate to come down to 2.2% from October’s 2.36%. The country’s consumer inflation dropped from a 14-month high, according to data released Thursday.
China on Thursday affirmed its recent policy shifts and stressed on plans to boost growth following a meeting that happened after China’s market close.
Futures for Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index stood at 20,219, pointing to a weaker open compared to the HSI’s close of 20,397.05.
Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 appears set to fall, with the futures contract in Chicago at 39,840 and its counterpart in Osaka at 39,730 against the index’s last close of 39,849.14.
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 started the day down 0.74%.
Overnight in the U.S., all three major indexes slid, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average losing 0.53% to mark its sixth straight losing day.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq retreated from the 20,000 mark and shed 0.66%, while the broad market S&P 500 shed 0.54% .
— CNBC’s Sean Conlon and Hakyung Kim contributed to this report.
