SINGAPORE — Shares in Asia-Pacific slipped in Thursday trade following overnight declines on Wall Street as bond yields rose again.
In Japan, the Nikkei 225 fell 2.78% while the Topix index shed 1.93%. South Korea’s Kospi also slipped 1.82%.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index declined 2.55% by the afternoon. Mainland Chinese stocks slipped, with the Shanghai composite down 1.58% and the Shenzhen component dropped 2.962%.
Shares in Australia also declined as the S&P/ASX 200 fell 1.58%. Australia’s January retail sales increased 0.5% month on month on a seasonally adjusted basis, according to data published Thursday by the Bureau of Statistics. That compared against expectations for a 0.6% increase in a Reuters poll.
The country also recorded a trade surplus of 10.142 billion Australian dollars (about $7.88 billion), higher than expectations in a Reuters poll for a 6.5 billion Australian dollar trade surplus.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan dropped 2.27%.
The moves came as the 10-year U.S. Treasury yield rose again, last sitting at 1.479%. Yields move inversely to prices. The benchmark rate surged to a high of 1.6% last week, in a move that some described as a “flash” spike — sparking concerns of stock valuations and a potential pickup in inflation.
Bond yields in Asia-Pacific also rose. The yield on the Australian 10-year bond advanced to 1.786% while the 10-year Japanese government bond‘s yield also jumped to 0.137%.
Tech stocks decline
Investors kept an eye on tech shares in Asia on Thursday after their counterparts stateside fell overnight amid a rise in bond yields.
Shares of Japanese conglomerate SoftBank Group dropped 6.01%. In South Korea, industry heavyweight Samsung Electronics fell 1.9% while chipmaker SK Hynix slipped 4.42%.
Hong Kong-listed shares of Chinese tech companies also suffered heavy losses: Tencent fell 3.87% while Meituan dropped 7.09% and Alibaba slipped 2.15%. In Taiwan, shares of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company shed 3.22%.
The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite dropped 2.7% to close at 12,997.75 on Wednesday, with shares of Apple, Amazon, Microsoft and Alphabet all dropping more than 2% each.
Other major indexes on Wall Street also declined on Wednesday: The S&P 500 fell 1.31% to 3,819.72 while the Dow Jones Industrial Average declined 121.43 points to 31,270.09.
Currencies and oil
The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of its peers, was at 91.073 following an earlier low of 90.988.
The Japanese yen traded at 107.02 per dollar, still weaker than levels below 106.8 against the greenback seen earlier in the week. The Australian dollar changed hands at $0.7776, weaker than levels above $0.792 seen last week.
Oil prices were higher in the afternoon of Asia trading hours on Thursday, with international benchmark Brent crude futures higher by 0.47% at $64.37 per barrel. U.S. crude futures gained 0.47%, trading at $61.57 per barrel.
In oil developments, OPEC and its non-OPEC partners — an energy alliance sometimes referred to as OPEC+ — are expected to convene via videoconference on Thursday to discuss how to manage supply to the market.
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— CNBC’s Sam Meredith and Yun Li contributed to this report.
Source: CNBC