Most of the Asian equity benchmarks are trading lower in the early deals on Wednesday amid worries about rising tensions between the US and North Korea after President Donald Trump warned that further threats from North Korea would be ‘met with fire and fury’. In response, North Korea said it was carefully examining a plan to strike the US-held Pacific island of Guam with missiles. Meanwhile, Japan's Nikkei share average tumbled on escalating geopolitical tensions on the Korean peninsula, which boosted the safe-haven yen and knocked stocks across the board. Among the other Asian markets, South Korea, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Taiwan, and Malaysia are all lower. Bucking the trend, Indonesia is higher. The Singapore market is closed for the National Day public holiday.
Nikkei 225 dipped 276.69 points or 1.38% to 19,719.32, Hang Seng dropped 225.23 points or 0.81% to 27,629.68, Taiwan Weighted slipped 84.77 points or 0.8% to 10,484.20, KOSPI Index declined 19.14 points or 0.8% to 2,375.59, Shanghai Composite contracted 6.87 points or 0.21% to 3,275.01, and FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI was down by 3.95 points or 0.22% to 1,777.70.
On the flip side, Jakarta Composite was up by 3.58 points or 0.06% to 5,814.15.