Asian shares mostly higher after Trump stops stimulus talks
Stocks were mostly higher in Asia on Wednesday despite an overnight decline on Wall Street after President Donald Trump ordered a stop to talks on another round of aid for the economy.
Markets rose in Hong Kong and Sydney but fell in Tokyo.
Trump’s announcement via Twitter came after Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell urged Congress to come through with more aid, saying that too little support “would lead to a weak recovery, creating unnecessary hardship.”
Hours after his tweets about ending the stimulus talks, though, Trump appeared to edge back a bit from his call to end negotiations, calling on Congress to send him a “Stand Alone Bill for Stimulus Checks ($1,200)”
Some analysts characterized Trump's move as likely a negotiating ploy.
“I do not believe hopes of a stimulus deal are now gone forever," Jeffrey Halley of Oanda said in a commentary. “One of Mr. Trump’s favorite negotiating tactics, judging by past actions, is to walk away from the negotiating table abruptly. The intention being to frighten the other side into concessions."
With Chinese markets closed for a weeklong holiday, trading in Asia has been subdued.
Hong Kong's Hang Seng rose 0.8% to 24,179.86 and the Kospi in South Korea surged 0.9% to 2,386,42. Japan's Nikkei 225 slipped 0.1% to 23,422.82.
Australia's S&P/ASX 200 jumped 1.3% to 6,036.40, as investors were cheered by the government's budget plan, which included tax cuts, subsidies and other stimulus to counter the impact of the pandemic.
Shares fell in Singapore but rose in Indonesia.
The S&P 500 index slid 1.4% to 3,360.97 after gaining 0.7% before the president’s announcement, which he made on Twitter about an hour before the close of trading. The late-afternoon pullback erased most of the benchmark index's gains...