Investing.com– Most Asian stocks pared early losses and rose on Thursday, although persistent concerns over slowing economic growth and higher interest rates kept markets volatile and still limited overall gains.
Regional markets took a negative lead-in from a weak overnight session on Wall Street, as a rebound from multi-month lows faltered. U.S. stock index futures also fell in Asian trade.
Heightened fears of a U.S. recession battered Wall Street in recent sessions, as did a string of middling earnings from heavyweight technology stocks.
Concerns over an economic slowdown in China also weighed after underwhelming trade data from the country on Wednesday.
Nikkei, TOPIX volatile as recovery stalls
Japan’s Nikkei 225 and TOPIX indexes moved in a flat-to-low range on Thursday as a rebound over the past two days ran dry. The two had fallen sharply in early morning trade, but pared a bulk of their losses.
Japanese stocks had rebounded from an over 10% rout in the past two days after some Bank of Japan officials attempted to downplay the bank’s hawkish outlook on interest rates.
But a summary of opinions of BOJ policymakers, released on Thursday, showed members of the central bank still saw room for more rate hikes, and that interest rates would have to reach around 1% to attain a level neutral to the economy.
An unexpectedly hawkish tone from the BOJ was the main driver of a recent rout in Japanese markets, which saw the Nikkei and the TOPIX enter bear market territory on Monday.
