\t\t\tAsia shares got off to a shaky start on Friday after US President Donald Trump unveiled a fresh round of punishing tariffs and as traders pared bets of sharp Federal Reserve rate cuts following stronger-than-expected economic data.<\/p>\n
In Hong Kong, the benchmark Hang Seng Index fell 212 points, or 0.8 percent, to open at 26,272.<\/p>\n
Across the border, the benchmark Shanghai Composite Index was down 0.35 percent to open at 3,839 while the Shenzhen Component Index opened 0.38 percent lower at 13,394.<\/p>\n
The ChiNext Index, tracking China’s Nasdaq-style board of growth enterprises, was down 0.42 percent to open at 3,222.<\/p>\n
Trump on Thursday announced that the United States would impose 100 percent duties on imported branded drugs, 25 percent tariffs on heavy-duty trucks and 50 percent tariffs on kitchen cabinets.<\/p>\n
He also said he would start charging a 50 percent tariff on bathroom vanities and a 30 percent tariff on upholstered furniture next week, with all the new duties to take effect from October 1.<\/p>\n
Japan’s Topix pharmaceutical index slid 1.4 percent in the wake of the news, while shares of Australian biotech firm CSL tumbled more than 3 percent.<\/p>\n
The Nikkei fell 0.5 percent, while MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was down 0.45 percent.<\/p>\n
“At this point of time, it sort of adds to a bit of a shaky backdrop we’ve got in terms of risk assets,” said Tony Sycamore, a market analyst at IG.<\/p>\n
Nasdaq futures were down 0.08 percent while S&P 500 futures dipped 0.02 percent.<\/p>\n
European futures meanwhile eked out gains, with Eurostoxx 50 futures up 0.37 percent while FTSE futures rose 0.25 percent.<\/p>\n
Also adding to headwinds for stocks were reduced expectations of aggressive Fed rate cuts, after a slew of data on Thursday showed the US economy remains in rude health.<\/p>\n
“[The] data deluge… gives the US economy a new lease on life,” said economists at Wells Fargo in a note.<\/p>\n
“Ultimately the updated GDP figures suggest the US economy was undeniably resilient in the first half of the year despite the on-again off-again approach to US trade policy.”<\/p>\n
Traders are pricing in just about 39 basis points worth of rate cuts by December, down from over 40 bps earlier this week.<\/p>\n
Focus will now be on personal consumption expenditure data due later on Friday, which could provide further clarity on the outlook for rates.<\/p>\n
“There was some bullish optimism built into markets, because everybody started thinking we’re going to get somewhere between four and six rate cuts, and now I think we’re probably looking at four at most, and maybe even that seems a bit generous at this point of time into the end of 2026,” said IG’s Sycamore.<\/p>\n
While most Fed policymakers continue to strike a cautious tone on the pace of future easing, the central bank’s newest policymaker, Stephen Miran, on Thursday pressed for sharp interest-rate cuts to prevent labour market collapse. (Reuters\/Xinhua)\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Asia shares got off to a shaky start on Friday after US President Donald Trump unveiled a fresh…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":169431,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[64,63,99,171],"class_list":["post-169430","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-markets","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-business","tag-markets"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169430","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=169430"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169430\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/169431"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=169430"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=169430"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=169430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}