Electronic screens display gongs at the Exchange Square Complex, which houses the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, in Hong Kong, China, on Tuesday, March 15, 2022.
This is CNBC's live blog covering Asia-Pacific markets.
Japan stocks led declines in Asia-Pacific markets on Wednesday, as investors parsed through earnings from the region, including reports from Japanese giants Toyota Motor and Mitsubishi.
Japan's Nikkei 225 dropped 1.63% to end at 38,202.37, while the broad-based Topix closed 1.45% lower at 2,706.43. Both indexes hit their lowest levels in almost two weeks.
Singapore's United Overseas Bank fell 2.9% even as the lender's net profit of 1.47 billion Singapore dollars ($1.08 billion) in the first quarter beat LSEG estimate of SG$1.43 billion. The Straits Times Index dropped 1.29%.
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Investors await China's April trade data and Japan's March pay numbers, both due Thursday.
Hong Kong's Hang Seng index fell 0.77%, while mainland China's CSI 300 index lost about 0.8% to close at 3,630.22.
HD Hyundai Marine Solution's shares nearly doubled in their trading debut, following the South Korean ship maintenance and repair firm's IPO, the country's largest since January 2022.
Money Report
The Kospi climbed 0.39% higher to its highest level in more than a month at 2,745.05, while the small-cap Kosdaq reversed losses to rise 0.13% and also hit a month-high level of 872.42.
Australia's S&P/ASX 200 inched up 0.14% to finish at 7,804.5, marking a five-day winning streak.
Overnight in the U.S., the Dow Jones Industrial Average notched a fifth straight day of gains. The S&P 500 inched up 0.13%, while the Nasdaq Composite slipped 0.1%.
— CNBC's Pia Singh and Hakyung Kim contributed to this report.
Shell to sell refinery and chemicals assets in Singapore for undisclosed sum
Shell said it will sell its refinery and chemicals assets in Singapore to CAPGC, a joint venture between Indonesia's Chandra Asri Capital and Swiss miner and commodities trader Glencore Asian Holdings.
While it did not disclose the value of the deal, the company said the transaction with CAPGC is expected to be completed by the end of 2024.
Shell's assets, located on Jurong Island and Pulau Bukom in Singapore, include a 237,000 barrels-per-day refinery and a 1.1 million tonnes-a-year ethylene cracker. The refinery was Singapore's first refinery in 1961.
The company added that staff in will continue their employment with CAPGC under the new ownership, and this will provide continuity for staff and contribute to ongoing operational reliability and safety.
— Lim Hui Jie
Toyota Motor expects annual operating profit to decline nearly 20%
Toyota Motor on Wednesday forecast lower operating profit for its current financial year.
The Japanese automaker said it expects operating income of 4.3 trillion yen ($27.7 billion) for fiscal year ending March 2025, which is about 20% lower than 5.35 trillion yen in the previous financial year.
Toyota said it will invest 380 billion yen, "to enhance the attractiveness of the automotive industry, provide support for supplier/dealer labor costs and invest in improving the environment for employees."
Shares dipped 0.7% initially, but changed course to rise 0.9%. The broader Nikkei 225 index fell 1.46%.
— Shreyashi Sanyal
UOB first-quarter net profit falls less than expected, helped by fee income
Singapore's United Overseas Bank posted a first-quarter net profit of 1.47 billion Singapore dollars ($1.08 billion), a 2% fall compared to the same period last year. This however, beat the mean estimate of SG$1.43 billion from analysts polled by LSEG.
Net interest income, a key profitability indicator, eased to 2%, mainly due to lower net interest margins compared with a year ago.
However, UOB highlighted that net fee income grew 5% year over year to SG$580 million, driven by loan-related, wealth management and credit card fees.
The bank, which is Southeast Asia's third largest, also said its integration with Citigroup's businesses was "progressing well," and said it will complete the integration in Vietnam in 2025.
Last year, UOB acquired Citi's consumer businesses in four ASEAN markets.
— Lim Hui Jie
Nintendo shares slide after results and announcement of new Switch console
Shares of Japanese video game company Nintendo slipped almost 4% after the company announced its fourth-quarter results. The company will also announce the successor to its flagship Switch console this fiscal year, according to a Google-translated post on X from the company which quotes Nintendo President Shuntaro Furukawa.
For the fiscal year ended March 2025, Nintendo forecast net sales of 1.35 trillion yen ($8.72 billion) and net profit of 300 billion yen, representing a 39% year-on-year fall in net profit. That was much lower than what analysts had forecast, according to LSEG estimates.
Nintendo's fourth-quarter results largely beat analysts expectations, except on revenue. It recorded 277.1 billion Japanese yen in sales versus the 280.6 billion yen expected.
Read the full results story here.
— Lim Hui Jie, Arjun Kharpal
CNBC Pro: Gold stocks and ETFs to buy right now, according to the pros
Macroeconomic uncertainties and mounting geopolitical tensions have given gold — the classic "safe haven" asset — a boost.
Gold prices topped $2,400 an ounce in April as tensions in the Middle East escalated. Spot gold is currently trading around 12% higher over the year to date.
Kevin Teng, CEO of wealth manager Wrise Group, said he expects the precious metal to yield substantive returns in the long term, and picked his favorite stocks and ETFs to cash in.
CNBC Pro subscribers can read more here.
— Amala Balakrishner
CNBC Pro: These tech stocks beat the S&P 500, and analysts still give them over 20% upside
U.S. stocks have been rather volatile in the past month, but in the past week they had a strong run on hopes of rate cuts.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average had its fourth consecutive winning session on Monday, and the S&P 500 also climbed for the past four days.
Tech stocks, which would be boosted by rate cuts, have been a big part of that rally — with Meta, Alphabet and Amazon in particular having a strong showing over the past couple of weeks.
Elsewhere, analysts are getting more optimistic on China stocks, especially those in the tech sector.
CNBC Pro screened FactSet for stocks from four exchange-traded funds. Here are eight that turned up on the screen.
CNBC Pro subscribers can read more here.
— Weizhen Tan
Chinese tech stock rally reverses course on Tuesday
The rally for stocks tied to China stumbled on Tuesday, with several of the country's top tech names under pressure.
Shares of JD.com slipped 1.8%, while Alibaba fell nearly 3%. The KraneShares CSI China Internet ETF (KWEB) was down 2.5%, giving back some of its solid year-to-date gains.
The trading action could be a reminder that Chinese stock rallies have proved hard to sustain in the past.
"China ETFs are among the few categories that have seen more net inflows than have current AUM – along with long duration bonds (TLT) and long volatility (VXX). We'd remind investors that the region's 30-year return is roughly 0%, so timing each side of the trade can be challenging," Strategas ETF strategist Todd Sohn said in a note to clients Tuesday.
— Jesse Pound
When May starts in an uptrend, stocks outperform 'through July,' Strategas says
"Sell in May and go away" adages notwithstanding, Strategas market technician Chris Verrone told clients Tuesday that when the S&P 500 starts May in an uptrend — as it is today — stocks have historically produced above-average performance through July. "The opposite is true when beginning this May through July period in a downtrend," he said.
"As this market continues to gather pace from late-April's oversold condition and reclaim some key levels (the S&P is back through its 50-day [moving average]), we'd look to seasonality as a tailwind into summer," Verrone wrote in a note to clients.
Other helpful signs for the market include credit spreads that have narrowed, the VIX Volatility Index returning "to its pre-correction levels," bank stock indexes at their highest since late March and consumer discretionary stocks doing better relative to consumer staples companies.
— Scott Schnipper
Fed's Kashkari sees extended pause on rates, won't rule out a hike
Minneapolis Federal Reserve President Neel Kashkari said Tuesday that he expects the central bank to sit tight on interest rates for an extended period, and did not rule out the possibility of a hike if the inflation metrics do not cooperate.
"The most likely scenario is where we are right now, which is, just, we stay put for an extended period of time until we get clarity on is disinflation, in fact, continuing, or has it, in fact, stalled out? I don't think we know the answer to that," the central bank official said at the Milken Institute Global Conference.
Interest rate cuts could come if inflation starts heading back to the Fed's 2% goal, though he said that is not his most likely case. Kashkari said he penciled in two rate cuts at the Fed's March meeting and would be reassessing when the Federal Open Market Committee updates its "dot plot" in June.
The remarks came the same day he published an essay on the Minneapolis Fed site questioning whether the neutral rate of interest is higher than what the Fed and financial markets think. If inflation holds higher than expected, that could bring a rate hike into play.
"The bar for us raising is quite high, but it is not infinite," said Kashkari, who is not an FOMC voter this year and will not be until 2026.
— Jeff Cox
