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The sunset glow is seen over buildings and a ferris wheel on May 13, 2022 in Beijing, China.
Vcg | Visual China Group | Getty Images
Asia-Pacific markets edged lower on Wednesday as investors look to key economic data from China, while chip stocks in China gained.
China will release its third-quarter gross domestic product data. Economists expect the country's economy to report growth of 4.4%, according to a Reuters poll.
The world's second-largest economy will also release its industrial output and retail sales data for September, as well as its urban unemployment rate.
The United States announced on Tuesday that it plans to prevent the sale of more advanced artificial intelligence chips to China in the coming weeks.
In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 started the day flat, about 0.04% higher, ahead of its unemployment figures on Thursday. The unemployment rate is one of the key metrics that the Reserve Bank of Australia considers when setting its monetary policy.
Japan's markets fell, with the Nikkei 225 down 0.48% and the Topix reversing early gains to fall 0.34%.
South Korea's Kospi was down marginally as well, with the Kosdaq slipping 0.77%.
Hong Kong's Hang Seng index fell 0.63%, while China's benchmark CSI 300 index dipped 0.38%. Hong Kong-listed SMIC jumped over 4%.
The Taiex in Taiwan dropped 0.58%. The Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company fell 0.91%.
BYD expects profit to almost double year on year for third quarter
Chinese electric car maker BYD forecast that its third-quarter net profit will come in between 9.55 billion yuan ($1.31 billion) to 11.55 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of about 67% to 101.99%. For comparison, net profit for the third quarter of 2022 stood at 5.72 billion yuan.
Earnings per share for the third quarter is expected to come in between 3.29 yuan per share and 3.97 yuan per share, a sharp jump from the 1.97 yuan per share a year ago.
In a filing to the Hong Kong exchange, BYD explained that sales volume for the company's new energy vehicles "continued to reach record highs," ranking first in the world in terms of new energy vehicle sales.
For its handset components and assembly business, BYD said it continued to improve its profitability due to factors like an expansion in business scale with overseas major customers, as well as a rebound in demand from Android customers.
— Lim Hui Jie
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Chipmaker stocks fall as U.S. tightens restrictions on exports to China
Popular chipmakers stocks slumped on Tuesday after the U.S. Department of Commerce said it plans to tighten its restrictions on the sale of advanced artificial intelligence chips to China.
Nvidia shares shed 7%, while Advanced Micro Devices dropped about 4%. Marvell Technology, Intel and Broadcom lost about 3% each.
The U.S. government said that the new rules aim to close loopholes that emerged following last year's curb on AI chip exports.
— Samantha Subin, Kif Leswing
Fed's Barkin backs patient approach to interest rate policy
Richmond Federal Reserve President Thomas Barkin said Tuesday he supported his colleagues' decision not to hike rates in September and believes the central bank can be patient from here.
"We have time to see if we have done enough, or whether there's more work to do," said Barkin, a nonvoting member this year of the rate-setting Federal Open Market Committee, said in remarks to real estate professionals.
Speaking the same day that a Commerce Department report showing stronger-than-expected retail sales in September, he said some of the data showing robust spending and growth doesn't jibe with his on-the-ground observations that demand is slowing.
—Jeff Cox
Retail sales rise 0.7% in September
In another sign of U.S. economic resiliency, retail sales rose 0.7%. Economists polled by Dow Jones expected a 0.3% increase. Excluding autos, sales increased by 0.6%. That was also above expectations.
— Fred Imbert
Goldman Sachs raises growth outlook for third quarter
Third-quarter economic growth should be even better than expected due to a surprisingly resilient consumer, Goldman Sachs said Tuesday.
Following a retail sales report that easily topped forecasts, the Wall Street firm boosted its third-quarter GDP outlook by 0.3 percentage point to 4%, which would be the strongest growth since the fourth quarter of 2021.
The Commerce Department earlier reported in its advance estimate that sales grew by 0.7% in September, which Goldman said helped raise its domestic final sales growth outlook to 2.8% for the quarter.
—Jeff Cox
English (US)