Asian equities traded mixed in a cautious open while the yen was on the front foot following potentially hawkish remarks by the Bank of Japan governor.

Share Market Live

NSE

Stocks fell in South Korea and rose in Japan, where financial stocks led the gains. Futures for Hong Kong equities were unchanged as the market is scheduled to reopen after a closure Friday due to a heavy rainstorm.

US stock futures were little changed early Monday after shares saw small moves at the end of the week, with the S&P 500 edging higher after a three-day drop. Nvidia Corp. and Tesla Inc. weighed on the megacap space, while Apple Inc. bounced after a rout that erased $190 billion in value just a few days before the unveiling of the iPhone 15, new smartwatches and the latest AirPods.

The yen strengthened 0.6 percent against the greenback and yield on the government’s 10-year bond jumped to the highest since 2014 after Ueda told the Yomiuri newspaper there may be sufficient information by year-end to judge if wages will continue to rise, which is a key factor in deciding whether or not to end super-easy policy. While this will fuel speculation that negative rates and yield-curve control are drawing near a close, the central bank chief also said the BOJ is some distance away from achieving its price stability target.

Ueda’s comments could be taken as asking market participants to prepare for a possible end to negative rates in the BOJ’s January policy meeting, according to Yasunari Ueno, chief market economist at Mizuho Securities, in a note.

Treasuries were little changed, while the dollar fell against all of its Group-of-10 counterparts after its recent rally drove the currency to a record streak of weekly gains. The greenback has been bolstered recently by bets the Federal Reserve will keep interest rates higher for longer as the US defies a global economic gloom.

The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index notched its eighth straight up week last week, the longest such run since 2005. The advance sent its 14-day Relative Strength Index above 70 — which is seen by some on Wall Street as a sign of an overbought market.

Fed Bank of New York President John Williams said late last week US monetary policy is “in a good place,” but officials will need to parse through data to decide on how to proceed on interest rates. His Dallas counterpart Lorie Logan noted that skipping an interest-rate hike at the central bank’s upcoming policy meeting may be appropriate, while also signaling rates may have to rise further to get inflation back to 2 percent.

A key data to help investors gauge the Fed’s next move is US inflation that will come out later this week.

“We saw a slight uptick in CPI in August, but I would anticipate it to be relatively flat in September,” Shana Sissel, Banrion Capital Management CEO, said on Bloomberg Television. With some weakness also in the job market, “the Fed will likely pause in September as they wait to see what happens with the data through the month of September,” she said.

Elsewhere, oil declined after a two-week rally and gold was little changed.

Also Read: Trade Setup for September 11: Will this week be "Abki baar 20,000 paar" for the Nifty 50?