A look at the day ahead in European and global markets from

Gregor Stuart Hunter:

Having passed through the autumn equinox to pumpkin-spiced

latte season, it's a little mysterious that markets have yet to

encounter any of the weakness historically found this time of

year. Until today, that is.

Stocks are falling across Asia after a sell-off on Wall

Street overnight fanned by softer-than-expected economic data

and comments from Jerome Powell that gave few clues about the

future path of interest rates. The MSCI Asia Pacific ex-Japan

index is off 0.2% around lunchtime for most of the region.

Still, soggy data aside, the index is still up 5.6% so far

this month and hovering near a four-year high. But the usual

dip-buyers were nowhere to be found, with U.S. stock futures

trading flat. In early European trades, pan-region futures were

down 0.4% at 5,470, German DAX futures were off 0.3% and FTSE

futures sank 0.3%.

Australian shares sank almost 1% after a

bigger-than-expected rise in consumer prices in August. Japan's

Nikkei stock index slid 0.5% after manufacturing sector activity

fell at the fastest pace in six months in September, driven by

further declines in new orders.

Even so, there were bright spots to be found, especially in

Chinese markets. Alibaba's Hong Kong-listed shares jumped 5%

after the e-commerce giant announced on Wednesday its largest

artificial intelligence language model to date, the Qwen3-Max,

which contains more than 1 trillion parameters. That's almost

six times as many as the original version of ChatGPT when it was

released three years ago.

Elsewhere, New Zealand on Wednesday named Anna Breman as its

new central bank governor, the first woman in the role, who

joins following a major shakeup at the bank amid criticism over

its management of the economy.

Breman is currently the First Deputy Governor of Sweden's

central bank, the Riksbank.

And Jimmy Kimmel is back on the airwaves after a six-day

suspension over on-air remarks about the man accused of

assassinating conservative activist Charlie Kirk. "I can't

believe ABC Fake News gave Jimmy Kimmel his job back," U.S.

President Trump wrote on Truth Social, threatening further

action against the network.

"Why would they want someone back who does so poorly, who's

not funny, and who puts the Network in jeopardy by playing 99%

positive Democrat GARBAGE," he posted.

Key developments that could influence markets on Wednesday:

Economic data:

Germany: Ifo Business Climate, Current Conditions and

Expectations for September

US: New home sales for August, EIA weekly crude oil stocks

Debt auctions:

Germany: 7-year government debt

U.K.: 4-year government debt