A mixed day here in Asia with most stock markets putting in scratch sessions following the poor lead overnight from Wall Street. The White House is getting a new economic advisor – Larry “I’m never right really” Kudlow, so that should work out fine. US stocks are facing their fourth night of losses if confidence doesn’t return to the table soon, and thus taking all the other markets down with it.
The Shanghai Composite put in a scratch session today, closing a few points lower at 3291, still shy of the key 3300 point level, but not making any new intrasession lows. The Hang Seng Index put some runs on the board, up 0.3% to 31522 points, with the daily price still gravitating around the high moving average band, but unable to breach rolling ATR resistance above at the 32000 point level:
S&P futures are relatively steady and are slowly rising after last night’s mild selloff, bouncing off possible support here at the 2750 point level:
Japanese stocks did a lot better than expected as Yen strengthened overnight, with the Nikkei 225 closing 0.12% higher to 21803 points, straight in the middle of its own moving average band as that market goes range bound. The USDJPY pair fell sharply below the 106 handle but is holding just below that level in what looks like only a temporary reprieve as momentum goes negative:
The ASX200 was the worst performer in the region, closing 0.2% or nearly 15 points lower to 5924, unable to gain any traction. The Australain dollar is stuck with some signs of a possible reversal here as it meets considerable resistance above the 79 cent handle against USD:
The economic calendar includes the Swiss Central Bank meeting later tonight and US initial jobless claims thereafter.