The Tokyo Stock Exchange canceled its morning gains on Thursday, contaminated in particular by the pessimistic tone of Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang on the national economy, weakened by drastic confinements once morest Covid-19 in the country.
The Nikkei star index lost 0.27% to 26,604.84 points while the Topix extended index ended around the balance (+ 0.05% to 1,877.58 points).
In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng index dropped 1.02% at 6:20 a.m. GMT, while mainland China stock markets held up a little better.
Chinese Premier Li Keqiang said on Wednesday that his country’s economy was at a “critical moment” facing difficulties “even greater than in 2020”.
“Li Keqiang may have just prepared the ground for an abandonment of this year’s growth target” by Beijing, according to Trivium China, a firm specializing in Chinese economic policy.
Tokyo and Hong Kong had however started Thursday’s session well following the publication the day before of the minutes of the discussions (“minutes”) during the last monetary policy meeting of the American Federal Reserve (Fed) in early May.
Bank leaders said several half-point (50 basis point) rate hikes will be “likely necessary” to bring US inflation under control, but none insisted on an increase of 75 basis points, which had somewhat reassured investors.
On the side of values
THE MITSUBISHI ELECTRIC SCANDAL CONTINUES TO INFLATE: The action of Mitsubishi Electric, a manufacturer of electrical equipment and systems used in many industrial sectors, fell 4.14% to 1,363.5 yen.
The group published a new preliminary report on Wednesday into a vast scandal of falsified internal quality controls, revealing around 100 new cases. This affair had prompted the general manager and then the chairman of the board of directors of Mitsubishi Electric to resign last year.
On the side of oil and currencies
Oil prices were up slightly, continuing to be supported as the day before by the possibility of an upcoming European agreement to give up Russian oil, even if Hungary remains opposed to it. After 06:45 GMT, the American barrel of WTI gained 0.36% to 110.73 dollars and that of the barrel of Brent from the North Sea took 0.3% to 114.37 dollars.
The dollar fell once morest the yen, at the rate of one dollar for 127.20 yen once morest 127.32 yen on Wednesday at 9:00 p.m. GMT.
The European currency also depreciated once morest the yen, at the rate of one euro for 135.73 yen once morest 136.00 yen the day before, and also fell once morest the greenback, at the rate of one euro for 1.0671 dollar once morest $1.0681.
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