Asia stock markets extend losses after Powell’s comments; Japan inflation slows

Malaysia’s consumer price index recorded a 1.9% increase year on year for September, lower than the 2% in August and also lower than the 2.2% expected by a Reuters poll.

This is lowest rate of inflation the country has seen since March 2021. Malaysia also has not seen an increase in its inflation rate for 13 straight months.

On a month on month basis, the consumer price index increased 0.1% in September, slightly lower than the 0.2% increase recorded in August.

— Lim Hui Jie

Bank Indonesia raised interest rates on Thursday in a surprise move to stave off the rupiah’s decline.

Indonesian rupiah traded 0.5% lower against the dollar on Thursday, after having lost nearly 2% this year.

Indonesia’s central bank raised the benchmark 7-day reverse repurchase rate by 25 basis points to 6%, its second hike this year. All economists polled by Reuters had expected the bank to leave rates unchanged.

“Policymakers batted for currency stability in the face of global uncertainties,” said Radhika Rao, senior economist of DBS Group Research, noting that the door remained open for more policy tightening as “Indonesian policymakers face a policy dilemma as global uncertainties outweigh recent positive domestic data outturns.”

Data ranging from inflation, trade balance and money supply will all be released before Bank Indonesia’s next policy meeting in November.

— Shreyashi Sanyal

China kept benchmark loan rates unchanged for October, after the slowdown in the world’s second-largest economy showed signs of stabilization following recent policy support.

The People’s Bank of China kept its one-year loan prime rate — the peg for most household and corporate loans in China — unchanged at 3.45%. The five-year benchmark loan rate — the peg for most mortgages — was held at 4.2%, according to a statement Friday from the Chinese central bank.

— Clement Tan

The yield on the benchmark U.S. 10-year Treasury crossed 5% for the first time in 16 years.

The 10-year Treasury yield hit 5.001% at 5:02 p.m. ET, the first time it has traded above that key level since July 20, 2007 when it yielded as high as 5.029%.

— Gina Francolla, Christine Wang

Japan’s headline inflation rate came in at 3% for September, slowing from the 3.2% rate in August.

However, this reading was the 18th straight month that inflation remained above the Bank of Japan’s 2% target.

Core inflation — which strips out prices of fresh food — also slowed to 2.8%, down from 3.1% in August.

Separately, the so called “core-core” inflation metric, which strips out prices of fresh food and energy and is watched by the BOJ, fell to 4.2% from 4.3% in August.

— Lim Hui Jie

Six global stocks look close to forming what’s known as a “death cross” chart pattern, indicating potential selling pressure in the near future.

A death cross is a price chart pattern that forms when a stock’s 50-day moving average crosses below its 200-day moving average. Technical analysts view this as a sign that investors are bearish on a stock or that a stock’s momentum is weakening and will continue to decline, with a potential buying opportunity soon. The death cross is also used as a bear market predictor.

CNBC Pro subscribers can read more about those six stocks here.

— Ganesh Rao

Investors have taken rallying gold prices as a signal that markets are risk averse in a period of rising bond yields and the escalation of the Israel-Hamas conflict. Spot gold was last trading around $1,957.39 per ounce, up roughly 8% from its October lows around $1,819.

However, Fairlead Strategies’ Katie Stockton expects that gold is “short-term overstretched” and could pull back next week. She expects the recent move higher is a bounce from its previous lows.

“Gold have really shot up this week,” Stockton said. “Everyone’s been very quick to say that it’s because there’s risk off now in the market, but I would disagree with that.”

“We have to contextualize it with what happened before this relief rally in gold, right, which was a really sharp downdraft. So, gold is basically right back to where it was in sort of mid to late September,” she added. “So we’ve seen a round trip in the price of gold.”

Pharmaceutical stocks such as Pfizer and Moderna were among the 26 S&P 500 names hitting fresh lows on Thursday. Shares of Illumina also traded at lows not seen since December 2016.

Elsewhere, United Airlines hit lows last seen in October 2022, while Southwest Airlines was trading at lows not seen since May 2020.

Here are some of the other names hitting fresh lows:

— Sarah Min, Gina Francolla