The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) held its cash rate steady at 4.35 per cent for a second straight meeting on Tuesday, saying the economy was slowing as expected, but warned it might yet hike again if needed to control inflation.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan swung between losses and gains and was up 0.36 per cent while South Korea’s KOPSI rose 1.3 per cent, as the latest escalation in Gulf hostilities kept market sentiment fragile.
Nasdaq futures edged 0.34 per cent higher while S&P 500 futures added 0.13 per cent after Wall Street ended lower in Monday’s cash session.
EUROSTOXX 50 futures were flat, while FTSE futures fell 0.05 per cent and DAX futures edged 0.07 per cent higher.
Overnight, Nvidia said it has partnered with six major financial institutions to launch compute financing platforms aimed at raising over US$500 billion in third-party capital for AI infrastructure, underscoring the scale of the sector’s investment boom.
“A small part of me was left wondering whether this is how it felt when sub-prime mortgages first became a mainstream product – the innovation that eventually helped trigger the GFC,” said IG’s Sycamore.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index was down 0.6 per cent, while China’s CSI300 blue-chip index eased 0.05 per cent.
Among currencies, the yen was back in the spotlight, struggling on the weaker side of 159 to the dollar and well off last week’s high of 155.20 after several suspected rounds of intervention, including a joint one by Japan and the United States.
“The market likely remains vigilant about further joint US-Japan yen-buying intervention, so USD/JPY breaching 160 in the very near term seems unlikely,” said analysts at Nomura in a note.
“However, the latest price action indicates there are quite a lot of USD/JPY dip-buyers, after the pair reached the 156-157 range for the first time since May.”
The dollar got a marginal lift from the renewed climb in oil prices, keeping the euro away from a 1.5-month high as it last traded at US$1.1541, while sterling eased from Monday’s one-month top and changed hands at US$1.3511.
Elsewhere, spot gold was up 0.33 per cent to US$4,402.52 an ounce.
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