Asian markets trade mostly lower in early deals on Tuesday

Most of the Asian equity benchmarks are trading down in the early deals on Tuesday as hawkish comments from US Federal Reserve officials clouded the monetary policy outlook less than a week after Fed Chair Janet Yellen had set out a more cautious path to interest rate increases this year. Though, modest overnight gains on Wall Street capped some losses. Meanwhile, the Japanese market is sharply higher as it resumed trading after a public holiday on Monday. The overnight gains on Wall Street, higher crude oil prices and a softer yen boosted investor sentiment. Japanese shares gave up some early gains after the release of a preliminary survey showing a deteriorating outlook for manufacturing in March. Contrary to expectations of an improvement, the Nikkei ‘flash’ purchasing manager’s index fell to 49.1 from 50.1 last month. It was the first dip below the 50 level dividing expectations of expansion versus contraction since April 2015. Among the other Asian markets, Shanghai, Taiwan, Indonesia, Hong Kong, and Malaysia are edging lower. Bucking the trend, Singapore, and South Korea are marginally higher.

Hang Seng declined 74.31 points or 0.36% to 20,609.84, Shanghai Composite dipped 23.66 points or 0.78% to 2,995.14, Jakarta Composite dropped 28.78 points or 0.59% to 4,856.38, FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI decreased 0.40 points or 0.02% to 1,717.96, and Taiwan Weighted was down by 90.39 points or 1.03% to 8,722.31.

On the flip side, Nikkei 225 surged 224.75 points or 1.34% to 16,949.56, Straits Times added 4.03 points or 0.14% to 2,884.72, and KOSPI Index was up by 0.34 points or 0.02% to 1,990.10.