Asia mostly lower amid data releases
Stock exchanges in the Asia-Pacific region were cautious in the afternoon trading on Wednesday as underwhelming data on China's services sector appeared to have propelled the negative sentiment. Investors will also be watching today's data on the trade balance and business activity in the United States. Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia and Russia agreed to extend their voluntary oil production cuts until the end of the year.
At 7:15 am CET, the Shanghai Composite lost 0.34% and the Shenzhen Composite dipped 0.45%. Hong Kong's Hang Seng slid 0.62%, South Korea's Kospi was down by 0.70%, and the Australian S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.79%.
However, Japan's Nikkei 225 added 0.47%, with the positive trajectory seemingly sparked by the latest remarks by the country's central bank. The dollar slipped 0.26% against the Japanese yen, selling at 147.34700 at 7:21 am CET.