Stocks in Australia were poised to notch a tepid open on Wednesday, with most major Asian markets closed for holidays.
SPI futures were at 6,324.0, as compared to the ASX 200’s last close on Tuesday at 6,325.50.
Asia-Pacific Market Indexes Chart
In overnight market action on Wall Street, the S&P 500 climbed to a new record, gaining about 0.1% to close at 2,945.83. The Dow Jones Industrial Average also added 38 points to finish its trading day at 26592.91.
The moves came amid the ongoing earnings season, with more than half of the S&P 500 companies having reported by the end of the trading day stateside on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, investors also continue to watch out for developments on the U.S.-China trade front. White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney said Tuesday that the Trump administration’s trade talks with China will be resolved within the next two weeks.
The U.S. Federal Reserve is also set to announce its monetary policy decision later on Wednesday stateside. Fed watchers will be closely monitoring if the central bank changes its dovish tone and how it plans to proceed with its balance sheet reduction program.
Ahead of that decision, U.S. President Donald Trump called for the Fed to slash interest rates by 1 percentage point and to implement more quantitative easing.
In a two-part Twitter post, the president unfavorably compared the Fed to its Chinese counterpart and said if monetary policy in the U.S. was looser, the economy would “go up like a rocket.”
“We expect the (Federal Open Market Committee) to leave the Funds rate steady. We also expect the FOMC to make no more than minor changes to its post‑meeting statement. The first paragraph of the post‑meeting statement will acknowledge Friday’s better than expected GDP growth. We expect little reaction by the USD to the FOMC meeting,” Joseph Capurso, senior currency strategist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia, wrote in a morning note.
There was, however, a “risk” the FOMC could lower the interest rate on excess reserves to “bring down the effective Funds rate,” he added.
The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of its peers, was at 97.479 following a decline from levels above 97.8 yesterday.
The Japanese yen traded at 111.43 against the dollar after strengthening from levels above 111.6 in the previous trading session. The Australian dollar changed hands at $0.7045 after swinging around the $0.705 handle yesterday.
— CNBC’s Yun Li and Jeff Cox contributed to this report.
