Widening Chinese trade deficit spurs pessimism in most Asian shares

12 Mar 2012 Evaluate

Majority of equity markets across Asia slipped lower in Monday’s trading session since investors lacked the conviction to open fresh positions after the upmove on Friday. The flat close on Wall Street with muted gains and the better than expected US jobs data that got released over the weekend failed to prop-up sentiments in the region as hopes of quantitative easing from the US Fed waned. Sentiments at large also got undermined after the worse than expected Chinese trade data highlighted that the nation’s trade deficit widened to the highest levels seen in at least a decade in February after imports of commodities jumped as companies built up supplies. Investors’ are growing increasingly worried over slowing global demand and cooling growth in the world's second-largest economy and one of the key global growth engine.

However, the better than expected Japanese core machinery orders data which climbed at a better than expected clip in January, helped the markets in bucking the pessimistic trends prevailing in rest of Asia and trade with gains of around one third percent. The equity index in South Korea traded with over half a percent loss as investors awaited US’ Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting which is scheduled to be held on Tuesday.

Shanghai Composite declined 8.09 points or 0.33% to 2,431.37, Hang Seng slipped 59.66 points or 0.28% to 21,026.34, Jakarta Composite eased 5.80 points or 0.15% to 3,985.74, KLSE Composite shed 9.42 points or 0.60% to 1,569.58, Seoul Composite fell 13.94 points or 0.69% to 2,004.36 and Taiwan Weighted dropped 31.56 points or 0.39% to 7,984.45.

On the flipside, Nikkei 225 gained 31.05 points or 0.31% to 9,960.79 and Straits Times rose 2.67 points or 0.09% to 2,965.82.

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