Asia Stocks See Volatility as Market Weighs Effect from COVID-19 and China’s Tariff Cut
Asia stocks traded mix as the market weighs investment sentiment on COVID-19 and China’s tariff cuts on US products worth $75 billion.
Stocks in Asia were mixed as concerns still remained over COVID-19, while investors were also looking forward to China’s tariff cuts on US products later today.
As of 9:25 local time in Thailand, Nikkei dipped 0.63%, SSEC slipped 0.07%, HSI gained 0.31%, ASX 200 rose 0.24% and Kospi edged 0.40% higher.
Yesterday, SET closed at 1,532.77 points, decreased 7.07 points or 0.46% with a trading value of 46.4 billion baht.
Hubei authorities reported 4,823 new cases along with 116 deaths on February 13 as the total cases in Hubei rose to nearly 52,000. The confirmed cases of COVID-19 switched from only a hundred or a thousand a day to around 15,000 cases on February 12, sparked immediate concerns to investors across the world.
Chinese authorities announced that the jumping number was due to a change in calculation method, which now included clinically diagnosed cases into the “confirmed cases”.
On the other hand, investors still had a ray of hope as February 14 will be the date that Beijing will cut tariffs on US import products worth $75 billion, according to the announcement from China’s Ministry of Finance on February 6, 2020, saying that the cut was to advance the healthy and stable development of China-U.S. trade.