An inflatable bull during a ceremony marking the first day of trading of the year at the Korea Exchange (KRX) headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, Jan. 2, 2024. SeongJoon Cho/Bloomberg via Getty Images
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Asia-Pacific markets were mixed Tuesday as the U.S. market took a breather following a rally sparked by optimism over the Federal Reserve’s interest rate stance at its latest meeting.
Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at CFRA Research, noted that equities have gotten expensive, with the S&P now trading at a 33% premium to its average price-to-earnings ratio over the last 20 years.
“We’re coming off of a post-FOMC high,” he told CNBC, referring to the U.S. Federal Reserve’s Federal Open Market Committee meeting last week. “The market is getting more and more vulnerable to a market decline or a pullback in prices.”
Investors in Asia also await economic data out of Southeast Asia, including Singapore’s manufacturing output and Thailand’s trade balance. Japan’s service producer price index for February came in at 2.1%.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 was opened flat, while the broader Topix edged 0.07% lower.
South Korea’s Kospi added 1.14% to hit its highest level since February 2022. The smaller-cap Kosdaq edged 0.18% higher.
In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.2%, after coming close to reaching its all-time high on Monday.
Futures for Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index stood at 16,497, pointing to a slightly stronger open compared to the HSI’s close of 16,473.64.
Overnight in the U.S., all three major indexes lost ground, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average down 0.41% and the S&P 500 dipping 0.31%, while the Nasdaq Composite was 0.27% lower.
— CNBC’s Lisa Kailai Han and Pia Singh contributed to this report