Asian Stocks Rise As US Jobless Claims Improve And China’s Inflation Heats Up; Hang Seng Index Leads Gains

Asian stock markets mostly showed gains, driven by the upbeat US Initial Jobless Claims and stronger-than-expected Chinese Consumer Price

Sophia Cruz•Friday, August 9, 2024•1 min read

Stocks closed down in red today, erasing October's gains

In today’s trading, Asian stock markets mostly showed gains, driven by the upbeat US Initial Jobless Claims and stronger-than-expected Chinese Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation data.

Asian Stocks Rise As US Jobless Claims Improve And China’s Inflation Heats Up; Hang Seng Index Leads Gains

The US Initial Jobless Claims report released on Thursday eased concerns about the US labor market. The US Department of Labor reported that new applications for unemployment benefits rose by 233k for the week ending August 3, down from the previous week’s revised figure of 250k (originally reported as 249k), and below the market expectation of 240k.

In Asia, China’s Shanghai Composite went up by 0.12% to 2,875, while the Shenzhen Component saw a slight increase of 0.06% to 8,450.

The Hang Seng index led the gains with a rise of 1.77% to 17,120. Chinese CPI inflation for July exceeded expectations, rising to 0.5% year-on-year from June’s 0.2%. The Producer Price Index (PPI) continued to decline by 0.8% year-on-year in July, matching June’s rate, but came in slightly better than the market consensus of -0.9%.

In Japan, major indices rebounded with the Nikkei 225 gaining 0.52% to 35,015 and the Topix advancing 0.51% to 2,475. The Japanese Yen weakened against the US Dollar for the fourth consecutive day, offering some relief to Japanese stocks.

Earlier in the week, the yen strengthened after an unexpected rate hike by the Bank of Japan, which triggered the unwinding of the popular carry trade —where investors borrow yen at low rates to invest in higher-yielding assets. However, this trend appeared to be stabilizing.

The Bank of Japan’s assurance that it would not raise interest rates amid market volatility also helped improve the market.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR See More

Sophia Cruz

Financial Writer - Asian & European Desks

Sophia is an experienced writer, reporter and newsdesk member, mostly on the financial sectors. For the past 5 years Sophia has covered a wide variety of topics such as the financial markets, economics, technology, fin-tech and trading. Sophia has been a part of the FX Leaders team since 2017 and works on producing valuable content and information for traders of all levels of experience.