FX.co ★ Another decline in Asian stock indices

Asian stock indices on Wednesday show negative trends. Thus, the Chinese Shanghai Composite and the Hong Kong Hang Seng decreased by 0.25% and 1.4%, respectively. The Japanese Nikkei 225 indicator lost 0.5%, and the Australian S&P/ASX - 200-0.2%. At the same time, the KOSPI index of South Korea increased by 0.25%.

Statistics show that economic growth in China has declined. It is evidenced by the decrease in industrial activity and retail trade due to new restrictive measures. At the same time, retail trade in the last month of this summer increased by 2.5% compared to the same period in 2020. According to analysts' forecasts, retail trade in August was expected to decline from the July level of 8.5% to 6.3%.

At the same time, the pace of industrial activity increased by 5.3% in the last month of summer. However, it was lower than in the previous month (the July level was 6.4%) and did not meet the expectations of experts, according to which the growth should have been 5.6%.

Securities of Sichuan HeBang Biotechnology Co. Ltd., Anyuan Coal Industry Group Co. Ltd., and CECEP Wind-Power Corp. added more than others (by 10%). The largest decline was shown by the shares of Sands China Ltd., which fell by 26.7%, Galaxy Entertainment Group Ltd. - by 17%, Wynn Macau Ltd. - by 24%, and MGM China Holdings Ltd. - by 18.5%.

At the same time, the securities of gambling houses in Macau have fallen significantly in price due to the information received that a serious strengthening of state regulation and control in this area is planned. Thus, it is planned to introduce direct monitoring of the games sector by persons authorized by the government.

Following the decline of the Japanese indicator, the shares of some Japanese companies also fell. So, the shares of SoftBank Group Corp. fell by 5%. Toyota Motor Corp, Honda Motor Co., Ltd., and Mazda Motor Corp lost 0.8%, 1.6%, and 2.3%, respectively.

Along with the growth of the South Korean indicator, the share price of Hyundai Motor Co. increased by 0.7%, Samsung Electronics Co. - by 0.9%, while the securities of SK Hynix Inc. fell by 0.5%.

Negative dynamics are also observed among the shares of the largest Australian companies. So, the shares of AGL Energy Ltd. fell by 6%, Beach Energy Ltd. - by 4%, Santos Ltd., and BHP Group Ltd. - by 3%.