Asian shares wobble as all eyes on US-China trade talks, FOMC

• China’s sluggish Industrial Profits and Hong Kong Protests drag Asian stocks down amid fewer optimism expectations from the US-China trade talks.
• Headlines concerning the UK-Iran tension, FOMC could also entertain traders.

Asian markets remain downbeat at the start of the key week comprising the US-China trade negotiations and the Fed meeting. Adding to the markets’ risk aversion is the on-going protests in Hong Kong and geopolitical tension between the UK and Iran.

With major news headlines suggesting no breakthrough from the 2-day trade talks in Beijing, start from Tuesday, traders remain on a back foot while taking the positions in the Asian markets. Further, protests in Hong Kong continue to drag Chinese indices down whereas Iran’s dislike for Britain deploying ships to Bahrain strengthens the risk-off.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia Pacific shares ex-Japan dropped to -0.68% by the press time while Japan’s Nikkie is also down -0.4%. Further, Australia’s ASX 200 and New Zealand’s NZX 50 bucked the trend with +0.55% and +0.47% gains respectively whereas India’s BSE Sensex registers -0.27% loss by the time of writing.

In addition to the political crisis at Hong Kong, sluggish prints of China’s Industrial Profits for June, to -3.1% versus +1.1% in May, also weighed on the dragon nation’s key index, Hang Seng.

While no major data is scheduled for publishing during the day, investors may remain on the sidelines ahead of the key events starting from tomorrow.