Shares in Asia-Pacific were mixed on Wednesday, with shares of China Evergrande Group recovering slightly after briefly falling below their IPO price.
By the Wednesday market close in Hong Kong, China Evergrande Group shares in the city rose 3.92%.
Still, the embattled property developer’s stock has dropped nearly 5% so far this week, extending declines since last week after it warned that it could default.
Moody’s Investors Service on Tuesday downgraded its rating, citing “heightened liquidity and default risks.” Rating agency Fitch also followed with a downgrade on Evergrande on Wednesday morning.
Hong Kong’s broader Hang Seng index closed 0.12% lower at 26,320.93.
Mainland Chinese stocks closed mildly lower, with the Shanghai composite slipping fractionally to 3,675.19 and the Shenzhen component shedding 0.101% to 14,688.08.
Elsewhere, South Korea’s Kospi shed 0.77% to close at 3,162.99 while the S&P/ASX 200 in Australia declined 0.24% on the day to 7,512.
In Japan, the Nikkei 225 rose 0.89% to close at 30,181.21 while the Topix index gained 0.79% to finish the trading day at 2,079.61.
Japan’s economy saw 1.9% annualized growth in the April to June quarter, higher than the initial estimate for a 1.3% rise, revised government data showed Wednesday.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan slipped 0.61%.
Bitcoin’s price fell following a recent surge above $52,000. It was last trading at $44,536.32 as of 4:22 a.m. ET Wednesday, according to data from Coin Metrics. The volatile moves in the cryptocurrency’s price came as El Salvador on Tuesday officially adopted bitcoin as legal tender, becoming the first country to do so.
Asian Markets Currencies and Oil
The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of its peers, was at 92.66 following a recent climb from below 92.4.
The Japanese yen traded at 110.14 per dollar, weaker than levels below 109.8 seen against the greenback yesterday. The Australian dollar changed hands at $0.7351 after yesterday’s decline from levels above $0.744.
Oil prices were higher in the afternoon of Asia trading hours, with international benchmark Brent crude futures rising slightly to $71.72 per barrel. U.S. crude futures advanced 0.15% to $68.45 per barrel
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