- Asian equities follow the general pre-NFP trading lull amid a light calendar.
- US House passes Democrats’ COVID-19 plan, the question over bipartisan deal remains unanswered.
- Trump quarantines himself and his wife after testing positive on virus, Australia ease entry restrictions from New Zealand.
- Hong Kong police arrest demonstrators, American Senators prefer Taiwan for trade deal.
Asian shares wobble ahead of Friday’s European trading as the pre-Nonfarm Payrolls (NFP) trading cautious mood joins a lack of major data/event and China’s off. Also confusing the traders are the headlines concerning the US coronavirus (COVID-19) stimulus package and American President Donald Trump’s quarantine. While portraying the market’s mood, MSCI’s index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan rises 0.30% and so does Japan’s Nikkei 225 which returned from Thursday’s technical glitch.
Although there is still no agreement between US House Speak Nancy Pelosi and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin over the much-awaited aid package, the House of Representatives passed the Democratic bill demanding $2.2 trillion of help to combat the pandemic. The issue will travel to Senate where Republicans are holding the majority and can be defeated easily.
On a different page, US President Donald Trump and wife Melania are quarantining themselves as their COVID-19 test results came in positive after one of the team members, Hope Hicks, got infected before a few hours.
Furthermore, the Financial Times came out with the news suggesting Hong Kong policymakers’ another crackdown on protestors, which may be disliked by the US. Alternatively, the American Lawmakers pressure USTR Robert Lighthizer, as per Politico, to strike a deal with Taiwan to side China form the global spotlight.
Elsewhere, Australia announced one-way quarantine-free travel into New South Wales (NSW) and the Northern Territory (NT) while talks surrounding Japan’s stimulus were recently tamed by the Finance Minister Taro Aso.
There are no major data on the cards but Australia’s Retail Sales flashed better than -4.2% preliminary forecast to -4.0%. Though, it doesn’t help ASX 200 to ignore the -0.60% drop, by now.
Stocks in New Zealand are mildly positive while those from South Korea are up around 1.0% despite the geopolitical noise. On the other hand, Indonesia’s IDX Composite bears the burden of fresh entry barriers from Singapore while declining 0.73% as we write.
It’s worth mentioning that opposed to the Asian stocks, the S&P 500 Futures recently tanked over 40 points to lose near 1.5% intraday ahead of the key US NFP data.
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