Most of the Asian equity benchmarks are trading lower in the early deals on Monday as traders watched the second US presidential debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump with Japanese, Taiwan and Hong Kong markets closed for holidays. Meanwhile, weaker than expected US jobs data released on Friday is seen by analysts as indicating that a rate hike at the Federal Reserve's December meeting remains on the table. The US Labor Department's report said non-farm payroll employment climbed by 156,000 jobs in September, compared to economist estimates for an increase of about 176,000 jobs. The unemployment rate rose to 5 percent from 4.9 percent. Among the other Asian markets, South Korea, Singapore and Indonesia are lower. Bucking the trend, Malaysia and Shanghai are higher.
Straits Times decreased 7.49 points or 0.26% to 2,867.75, KOSPI Index contracted 4.36 points or 0.21% to 2,049.44, and Jakarta Composite was down by 0.22 points to 5,376.93.
On the flip side, FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI added 1.64 points or 0.10% to 1,667.02, and Shanghai Composite was up by 37.47 points or 1.25% to 3,042.18.