Tourists visiting Nanjing Road scenic spot in Shanghai, China, on October 20, 2025.
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Asia-Pacific markets fell on Friday, tracking losses on Wall Street as tech stocks remained under pressure and amid speculation of a Fed interest rate cut.
Japanese benchmark Nikkei Stock Average The index fell by 1.77% to close at 50,376.53, while TOPIX fell by 0.65% to close at 3,359.81.
Japanese giant SoftBank plunged nearly 9% in early trading, falling for the third day in a row, after announcing on Tuesday that it had sold all its shares. Nvidia. The company’s stock price closed down 6.57%.
South Korea’s Kospi fell 3.81% to 4,011.57, and the small-cap Kosdaq fell 2.23% to 897.9. index heavyweight samsung electronics While it fell more than 3%, SK HynixNVIDIA’s memory chip supplier fell 5%.
South Korea’s exchange rate against the won rose 0.72% to $1,460.0 after the country’s finance minister announced on Friday that the country’s foreign exchange authorities would discuss ways to stabilize the won with key market players, including the national pension fund and major exporters, Reuters reported.
Finance Minister Koo Yoon-cheol told senior economic officials that measures are needed to address the structural mismatch between supply and demand for the U.S. dollar, amid growing concerns about currency market volatility, the report said.
australian S&P/ASX 200 It fell 1.36% to 8,634.5.
hong kong Hang Seng Index The mainland’s CSI300 index fell 1.57% to 4,628.14 after government data on Friday showed China’s economic slowdown worsened in October, dragged down by weak consumer demand and a deepening real estate recession.
Fixed asset investment, including real estate, fell 1.7% in the first 10 months of the year, sharply down from a 0.5% decline in the January-September period. Industrial production rose 4.9% in October compared to the same month last year, falling short of the expected 5.5% increase and slowing from the 6.5% increase seen in the previous month.
Retail sales in October rose 2.9% year-on-year, exceeding the Reuters poll’s forecast (2.8% increase), but slowed down from September’s 3% year-on-year increase.
China’s domestic yuan rose to a one-year high of 7.0908 yuan against the dollar, according to LSEG data.
CNY
In the US market overnight, the average share price of all three major companies closed lower as investors continued to sell shares in technology companies, particularly those related to artificial intelligence, due to concerns about valuations.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 797.60 points, or 1.65%, to settle at 47,457.22, well above the all-time high set in the previous session. The S&P 500 index fell 1.66% to end at 6,737.49.
In the broader index, the information technology and communications services sector, led by Disney, was the most depressed, with mixed results in the fiscal fourth quarter, down nearly 8%. The Nasdaq Composite Index fell 2.29% to close at 22,870.36. The three major stock averages and the small-cap Russell 2000 index had their worst day since October 10th.
Recent comments from Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s colleagues suggest there is a lot of concern about whether the Fed should implement its third straight stimulus package at its Dec. 9-10 meeting.
Boston Fed President Susan Collins recently said, “Given my fundamental outlook, it would be appropriate to keep interest rates at current levels for some time to balance inflation and employment risks in this highly uncertain environment.”
As a result, the market readjusted its expectations. Until a few days ago, traders were pricing in at least a 2-to-1 chance of a quarter-point rate cut, but that has now been reversed by the coin toss, according to futures market figures compiled by CME Group’s FedWatch tool.
—CNBC’s Jeff Cox, Sean Conlon and Pia Singh contributed to this report.
