Asian stocks: Mildly bid as US-China reaches phase one consensus

• Receding doubts over immediate trade deal please Asian share buyers.
• Australia’s S&P/ASX gains 0.80% after RBA’s Debelle marks a downbeat tone.
• Uncertainty surrounding the phase two, Hong Kong and the Fed’s optimism keep equities under check.

With the trade positive headlines keep flooding in, Asian shares register gains while heading into the European session on Tuesday. As a result, MSCI’s index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan marks nearly 0.20% of gains while Japan’s NIKKEI gains around 0.60% by the press time.

Details of the phone call between the United States (US) Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and China’s Vice Premier Liu He suggest that both the countries are near to resolving issues surrounding the phase one deal. However, odds concerning the second round are still thin.

Markets were also affected by the comments from the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) and the US Federal Reserve (Fed) policymakers. While the RBA’s Guy Debelle raised concerns about the employment details while leaving doors open for further action, if needed, Fed’s Chairman Jerome Powell refrains from any new comments but held an upbeat bias for the present policy.

With this, stocks in Australia and New Zealand are near to 1.0% gains while that from China seesaws around 0.20%. It’s worth mentioning that comments from the Hong Kong leader Carry Lam that the recent election results will be taken seriously to hear public voters, HANG SENG turns down the assurance while taking rounds to 0.10%.

Further, the US 10-year Treasury yields seesaw near 1.76% and the S&P 500 Futures mark around 0.10% gains by the time of writing.

Moving on, the active economic calendar of the US and comments from the RBA, Fed and the European Central Bank (ECB) policymakers will be closely followed for fresh impulse. Though, this won’t dim the prospects of trade headlines to move the market.