Most of the Asian equity benchmarks are trading lower in the early deals on Tuesday tracking Wall Street's decline, as jittery investors awaited the US Federal Reserve's decision on interest rates and Britain's vote on European Union membership. Meanwhile, Japanese shares were hit by falling government bond yields and a strengthening yen, as investors await the FOMC meeting along with monetary policy announcements from the Bank of Japan, Bank of England and Swiss National Bank. Among the other Asian markets, South Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Taiwan are in negative territory. Bucking the trend, Indonesia and Taiwan are higher.
Nikkei 225 dipped 224.28 points or 1.40% to 15,794.90, Hang Seng slipped 51.42 points or 0.25% to 20,461.57, Shanghai Composite contracted 7.07 points or 0.25% to 2,826.00, KOSPI Index dropped 9.81 points or 0.50% to 1,969.25, Straits Times declined 6.77 points or 0.24% to 2,778.66, and FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI was down by 3.57 points or 0.22% to 1,626.20.
On the flip side, Taiwan Weighted added 23.83 points or 0.28% to 8,560.05, and Jakarta Composite was up by 7.38 points or 0.15% to 4,814.61.