Asian stocks rise with inflation on tap; China lags behind Investing.com

Investing.com– Most Asian shares rose on Monday, extending a rebound from last week, amid rising hopes that worries about a U.S. recession were overblown, pointing directly to a number of key inflation readings in this week.

Chinese markets lagged their peers, mostly missing out on last week’s recovery amid lingering concerns about the country’s economic slowdown. A string of key June quarter earnings are also due this week.

A market holiday in Japan caused trading volumes to be weaker in Asia, although they were still up.

Regional markets took positive cues from a strong close on Wall Street on Friday, which saw US equity benchmarks erase all of their losses last week. U.S. stock index futures fell slightly in Asian trade.

Much of the focus this week is on Wednesday’s US consumer price index data for more clues on when the Federal Reserve will start cutting interest rates. Investors are split between a discount of 25 and 50 basis points in September.

South Korea was the best performer in Asia, up 0.9 percent on gains in technology stocks.

Australia rose 0.5%, while most Southeast Asian markets rose slightly.

Chinese stocks are in the gap, major gains on tap

Indices and China moved in a flat-to-low range on Monday, while Hong Kong’s index fell 0.2 percent.

Sentiment toward China remained limited by lingering concerns about the country’s slowing economic recovery, particularly after a string of weak readings for July.

Although recent inflation data showed some improvement, it remains to be seen whether China’s disinflationary trend reverses.

This week the focus is on the earnings of some of China’s biggest internet firms, with Tencent Holdings Ltd (HK:), Alibaba Group (NYSE:) (HK:) and JD.com (HK:) (NASDAQ:) are set to report their June quarter results this week.

Indian markets open soft amid Hindenburg-SEBI showdown

for India index pointed to a weak opening on Monday as sentiment towards Indian markets was soured by fresh allegations against India’s securities regulator from short seller Hindenburg Research.

The firm alleged that Securities and Exchange Board of India chief Madhabi Puri Buch invested in offshore funds linked to the Adani Group. This comes after Hindenburg took a short stand against Adani last year over allegations of fraud and share price manipulation against the Indian conglomerate.

SEBI issued an advisory on Sunday asking investors to remain calm before reacting to any Hindenburg report.

The Nifty and the have settled near record highs after a stellar rally for most of 2024. But that has also made Indian stocks more vulnerable to volatility and profit-taking.

of India is also scheduled for Monday and is expected to show some cooling of price pressures.