Oil prices hold steady after slipping earlier in the week
Shares mostly declined Friday across major Asian exchanges, with US stock futures little changed after a Thursday rally on Wall Street that was driven by a US wholesale inflation report showing price pressures are easing at the producer level.
The Thursday report showed prices at the US wholesale level were 4.7% higher last month than a year earlier, according to an Associated Press dispatch from Bangkok. While elevated, the July reading was below June’s 5.5% annual rate and came in slightly better than what economists had forecast.
The data helped push the S&P 500 to an all-time closing high. The broad market index added 0.7% to finish Thursday at 7,798.99. The technology-heavy Nasdaq composite climbed 0.8% to 26,803.03, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average of 30 large US companies edged up 0.1% to 53,839.99.
Asian trading on Friday produced a split tape. Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index gained 0.3% to close at 68,533.85, while South Korea’s Kospi climbed 1.3% to 6,924.74. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng, by contrast, fell 1% to 25,137.87, and the Shanghai Composite Index lost 0.5% to 3,908.05.
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 slipped 1.1% to 9,090.90. Taiwan’s Taiex gave up 0.2%, and India’s BSE Sensex retreated 0.5% in the regional session.
Oil prices held steady after slipping in recent sessions, the AP reported.
The dispatch did not specify which agency issued the wholesale price report or include attributed analyst commentary on the data. The AP report was written by Elaine Kurtenbach.