WASHINGTON, Jan 2: European benchmarks were higher Tuesday after Asian markets mostly fell on the first trading day of 2024.
US futures were higher and oil prices gained more than $1.
Hong Kong’s benchmark fell more than 1% and Shanghai also declined after data showed more signs of weakness in the Chinese manufacturing and property sectors.
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The future contract for the S&P 500 edged 0.1% higher and that for the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.2%.
Germany’s DAX gained 1% to 16,927.63. In Paris, the CAC 40 was 0.6% higher to 7,587.62. Britain’s FTSE 100 was up less than 0.1% to 7,734.75. Investors were awaiting the release of euro-zone manufacturing statistics later in the day.
The Hang Seng index in Hong Kong sank 1.6% to 16,784.00 and the Shanghai Composite index dropped 0.4% to 2,962.28.
Investors were selling property developers like debt-laden China Evergrande, which fell 6%, and LongFor Group Holding, which lost 6.9%. Sino-Ocean Holding declined 4.6%.
The December survey of the official purchasing managers index, or PMI, in China fell to 49 for the third consecutive month, signaling weak demand and underscoring the challenging economic conditions in the world’s second-largest economy.
That contrasted private-sector survey, by financial publication Caixin, which registered a slight improvement in the manufacturing PMI to 50.8, driven by increased output and new orders. However, it showed that business confidence for 2024 remained subdued.
The latest data also showed that the value of new home sales by China’s top 100 developers fell nearly 35% from a year earlier in December despite moves by regulators to lift limits on such transactions.
South Korea’s Kospi gained 0.6% to 2,669.81 and the S&P/ASX 200 in Australia rose 0.5% to 7,627.80.
Bangkok’s SET added 1.2% while the Sensex in Mumbai lost 0.5%.
Japan’s markets were closed for a holiday.
Stocks fell Friday on Wall Street from their near all-time high amid easing inflation, a resilient economy and the prospect of lower interest rates which buoyed investors.
The S&P 500 slipped 0.3%. The benchmark index still posted a rare ninth consecutive week of gains and is just 0.6% shy of an all-time high set in January of 2022. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.1% and the Nasdaq composite slipped 0.6%.
In other trading, U.S. benchmark crude oil gained $1.13 to $72.78 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Brent crude, the international standard, added $1.37 to $78.41 per barrel.
The U.S. dollar rose to 141.55 Japanese yen from 140.88 yen. The euro fell to $1.1035 from $1.1047. (AP)
