"Asian Stocks" Asia-Pacific stock markets generally fell, with significant declines in the Japanese and South Korean stock markets; LG Energy Solution dropped over 8%

The market is waiting for the Bank of England, the European Central Bank, and Taiwan to announce their interest rate decisions today (18th). The Asia-Pacific stock markets generally fell this morning, influenced by the decline of US technology stocks the previous night (17th), with significant drops in the Japanese and South Korean stock markets. The market is also awaiting the release of US inflation data later.

The People's Bank of China conducted a seven-day reverse repurchase operation in the open market and restarted the 14-day reverse repurchase operation, with a net injection of 69.7 billion yuan for the day. The Shanghai Composite Index closed at 3,876 points, up 6 points or 0.2%; the Shenzhen Component Index reported 13,111 points, down 112 points or 0.9%. The Hong Kong Hang Seng Index fell 111 points or 0.4% to 25,357 points, with a turnover of 79.1 billion yuan. The Taiwan Weighted Index fell 82 points or 0.3% to 27,443 points. TSMC and Hon Hai fell 0.4% and 0.5%, while MediaTek remained stable at 1,425 New Taiwan dollars.

The Japanese Nikkei Average fell 557 points or 1.1% to 48,954 points. Renesas Electronics and Advantest fell 4% and 3.8%, while Tokyo Electron and Disko fell 3.2% and 3%. SoftBank fell 3.3%.

The South Korean Kospi Index fell 59 points or 1.5% to 3,996 points. Ford canceled a $6.5 billion electric vehicle battery deal with LG Energy Solution, which dropped 8.4%. Samsung Electronics fell 1.7%, while Hyundai Motor and Hyundai Heavy Industries fell 1.8% and 3.1%. SK Hynix rose 1.1% against the trend.

The Indian Nifty50 Index fell 25 points or 0.1% to 25,792 points. Infosys rose 1.3%. Automotive stocks Mahindra & Mahindra, Tata Motors, and Bajaj Auto fell between 1.6% and 1.8%.

The Australian S&P/ASX 200 Index fell 6 points or less than 0.1% to 8,578 points at the close. Mining stocks BHP and Rio Tinto rose 0.8% and 1.1%. The New Zealand Exchange 50 Index fell 39 points or 0.3% to 13,256 points at the close.

The Bank of Thailand lowered interest rates by 25 basis points as expected, to 1.25%, a three-year low. The Bank of Indonesia announced yesterday to keep the benchmark interest rate unchanged at 4.75%, in line with expectations. The Singapore Straits Times Index fell 10 points or 0.2% to 4,564 points, with DBS falling 0.4% and CapitaLand falling 1.6%. The Malaysian and Indonesian stock markets each rose by less than 0.1%, while the Thai stock market fell by less than 0.1%. The Philippine stock market fell 0.4%. The Hanoi stock market in Vietnam rose 0.2%, while the Ho Chi Minh stock market fell 0.1%