Asian markets ended mostly in green on Wednesday led by the overnight gains in the US markets, which surged on dovish testimony by Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen, where she indicated that the Fed is not likely to begin raising interest rates for at least the next couple monetary policy meetings. The Chinese market that opened after a week long holiday ended with marginal cut after a volatile session of trade on HSBC's latest factory activity report, which showed export orders in February had shrunk at their fastest rate in 20 months. Though, the Hang Seng market posted modest gains despite the region’s economy missing growth expectations for 2014, expanding by 2.3% compared with 2.9% a year earlier. Traders were encouraged by the budget of the country various licensing and administration fees for restaurants, hotels and travel agencies were waived to try to boost tourism. The Japanese market gave all its early gains to end mildly in red.
Asian Indices | Last Trade | Change in Points | Change in % |
Shanghai Composite | 3,228.84 | -18.06 | -0.56 |
Hang Seng | 24,778.28 | 28.21 | 0.11 |
Jakarta Composite | 5,431.08 | 13.77 | 0.25 |
KLSE Composite | 1,815.86 | -2.82 | -0.16 |
Nikkei 225 | 18,585.20 | -18.28 | -0.10 |
Straits Times | 3,440.67 | 3.06 | 0.09 |
KOSPI Composite | 1,990.47 | 14.35 | 0.73 |
Taiwan Weighted | 9,699.54 | 70.17 | 0.73 |