Good morning, you're tuned in to Markets Desk, and here's where things stand.
In Asia, Japanese equities are pulling back Thursday, with the Nikkei two twenty-five slipping below the sixty-four thousand nine hundred fifty level. Financial and technology shares are leading the decline, and notably, Wall Street's overnight strength is doing little to lift sentiment — a sign that domestic pressure is doing the heavier lifting here.
Across the strait, Hong Kong's Hang Seng is coming off back-to-back losing sessions, shedding nearly two hundred eighty points, or about one point one percent, in that stretch. The index is sitting just under twenty-five thousand three hundred thirty, though traders are watching for a potential stabilization Thursday as some of the recent selling pressure appears to be losing momentum.
Shifting to commodities, cotton futures closed lower Wednesday across most active contracts, dropping between thirty-three and one hundred twenty-one points. The pressure came from multiple directions — a firmer dollar index, which settled near ninety-nine point one five, and a sharp drop in crude oil of four dollars and forty-eight cents added to the weight. Crop progress data showing just over half the domestic cotton crop planted added further uncertainty to the demand picture.
That's the tape. Markets Desk, signing off the floor.
