Most of the Asian equity benchmarks are trading lower in the early deals on Tuesday, as the region was rattled by a ballistic missile launch in which the projectile flew over Japan and fell into the Pacific Ocean. Meanwhile, Japan’s Nikkei share average fell to its lowest in almost four months as a missile fired by North Korea over northern Japan put investors on edge and increased the yen’s safe-haven appeal. Among the other Asian markets, Singapore, Hong Kong, Malaysia, South Korea, Indonesia and Taiwan are lower. Bucking the trend, Shanghai is higher.
Nikkei 225 declined 117.87 points or 0.61% to 19,332.03, Hang Seng dropped 100.2 points or 0.36% to 27,763.09, Taiwan Weighted slipped 43.16 points or 0.41% to 10,482.82, Jakarta Composite crumbled 28.29 points or 0.48% to 5,875.06, KOSPI Index contracted 18.57 points or 0.78% to 2,351.73, FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI decreased 8.09 points or 0.46% to 1,761.40, and Straits Times was down by 7.83 points or 0.24% to 3,259.79.
On the flip side, Shanghai Composite was up by 2.07 points or 0.06% to 3,364.72.