* MSCI Asia-Pacific ex-Japan 0.79% lower
* China’s Shenzhen CSI 300 0.9% lower
* Dollar gain on euro, yen as US yields accelerate
* Nasdaq falls 2.4%, confirming correction
SYDNEY / NEW YORK, March 9 (Reuters) – Asian equities were lower on Tuesday as rising bond yields affected technology stocks and company valuations in China and Korea, and investors struggled with their inflation fears as the United States appears to be a stimulus of $ 1.9 billion will succeed. parcel.
MSCI’s largest Asia-Pacific stock index outside Japan was 0.79% lower, while Korea’s Kospi fell 1.88%, its fourth consecutive session with losses. The Japanese Nikkei retreated earlier losses in the session to 0.24% higher.
US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on Monday that President Joe Biden’s aid package for coronavirus would provide enough resources to fuel a ‘very strong’ economic recovery in the US, noting that there are ‘tools’ to deal with inflation.
Despite the positive indications, investors remain in conflict over whether the stimulus will help accelerate world growth due to the COVID-19 downturn or whether the world’s largest economy will overheat and lead to runaway inflation. lead.
“The chances of us seeing more inflation in the economy are significantly increased by the monetary and fiscal policies we see worldwide,” Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon told a news conference in Sydney via a webcast said.
“There is definitely a reasonable outcome where inflation is accelerating faster than people expect, and that will obviously have an impact on the markets and volatility.”
The technology sector and other rich companies were very susceptible to the rising rates.
Australian equities watched overnight gains on Wall Street, with the major S & P / ASX 200 index rising 1.04% on Tuesday. However, Australian technology stocks slipped for the sixth consecutive session in line with their US counterparts.
The index led gains to be just 0.40% higher in afternoon trading following the declines in technology and a 10% drop in shares of Insurance Australia Group ahead of an announcement on the insolvency of financial services provider Greensill Capital.
China’s blue chips were 1% lower, while Hang Seng’s rose by 0.9% in Hong Kong.
On Wall Street, the Dow has advanced, while the Nasdaq has plunged more than 2%, a drop of more than 10% since its February 12 high and confirmed a correction in the index value.
The Dow Jones industrial average rose 0.97%, the S&P 500 lost 0.54% and the Nasdaq Composite fell 2.41%.
The pan-European STOXX 600 index. STOXX rose 2.10% and MSCI’s stock shares around the world rose 0.02%.
“If rates rise because people are optimistic about economic growth, it is still supportive of stock prices,” said Tom Hainlin, a global investment strategist at US Bank Wealth Management’s Ascent Private Wealth Group in Minneapolis.
U.S. Treasury yields have risen as investors continue to price higher inflation and more optimistic outlook for the U.S. economy, as evidenced by the coronavirus pandemic.
The standard yield for ten years rose to 1.6029%, from 1.594% late on Monday.
In foreign exchange markets, the dollar index peaked at three and a half months, up 0.523%, with the euro up 0.06% to $ 1.185.
Oil prices were higher on Tuesday but could not recover profits on Monday after attacks on oil facilities in Saudi Arabia raised prices to the highest level since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Brent crude futures rose 33 cents, or 0.51%, to $ 68.57 a barrel. U.S. crude futures were up 27 cents, or 0.42% higher at $ 65.32.
Spot gold added 0.4% to $ 1,688.42 per ounce.
Reporting by Paulina Duran and Matt Scuffham; Edited by Sam Holmes and Christian Schmollingr