SINGAPORE: Asian stocks edged higher on Friday, riding a tech-driven rally on Wall Street, with investor focus now turning to a key U.S. inflation reading due later in the day for further clues on the Federal Reserve’s rate outlook.
The results from artificial intelligence heavyweight Nvidia’s this week, which fell short of investors’ lofty expectations, still confirmed that AI infrastructure spending remains strong, helping lift the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average to record high closes overnight.
Markets in Asia latched on to the positive momentum on Friday as MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan rose 0.4%, though European and U.S. stock futures slipped.
EUROSTOXX 50 futures fell 0.2% while FTSE futures eased 0.08%. S&P 500 futures dipped 0.08% and Nasdaq futures lost 0.15%.
“Despite the uncertainty around China for Nvidia, the headline revenue growth numbers don’t really suggest that the overall AI story is faltering much. Expectations are just already very high,” said Thomas Mathews, head of markets for Asia-Pacific at Capital Economics.
“The big picture though is that earnings are still growing very rapidly for U.S. tech companies, and unless that changes materially, the stock market there will probably keep doing ok.”
In China, the tech-focused STAR 50 Index slid 2.5% after a jump of more than 7% in the previous session.
Shares of Chinese chip firm Cambricon Technologies tumbled more than 5% after the company on Thursday issued a risk alert to investors in a stock exchange filing, citing a sharp rise in its stock prices since late July.
“Certainly, when you see such a very, very large move, and then some warning coming from the company, you could think that there has been a little bit of overshooting,” said Frank Benzimra, head of Asia equity strategy at Societe Generale.
“But for me, that is a very normal way of the market functioning, because we all know that the market is going to undershoot on the downside and to overshoot on the upside.”
Still, the CSI300 blue-chip index was up 0.7% and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index gained 0.5%. Japan’s Nikkei slipped 0.4%.
WAITING ON PCE
In the broader market, focus now turns to the release of the U.S. PCE price index data – the Fed’s preferred measure of inflation – later on Friday.
“The market will be on the lookout for any signs of whether or not some of these tariff pass-throughs are starting to filter through into the PCE deflator,” said Khoon Goh, head of Asia research at ANZ.
“There are three important pieces of data ahead of the September FOMC. So there’s the PCE, then there’s the payrolls number next week, and then the CPI reading.”
Traders are currently pricing in an 86% chance of a rate cut in September, up from 63% a month earlier, according to the CME FedWatch tool.
Fed Governor Christopher Waller on Thursday said he wants to start cutting interest rates next month and “fully expects” more rates cuts to follow to bring the Fed’s policy rate closer to a neutral setting.
The heightened expectations of imminent Fed rate cuts left the dollar headed for a monthly fall of 2% against a basket of currencies on Friday.
The euro was last down 0.2% at $1.1657, pressured in part by political and fiscal worries in France, while sterling eased 0.08% to $1.3497, though was set for a monthly gain of more than 2%.
The dollar was also battling headwinds from worries about Fed independence as President Donald Trump steps up his campaign to exert more influence over monetary policy, including his latest attempt to fire Fed Governor Lisa Cook.
Cook filed a lawsuit on Thursday claiming Trump has no power to remove her from office.
Elsewhere, oil prices fell on Friday, with Brent crude futures down 0.68% to $68.15 a barrel, while U.S. crude slid 0.7% to $64.14 per barrel.
Spot gold was down 0.17% at $3,410.69 an ounce. – Reuters