Investing.com - Hong Kong stocks led Asia lower on Wednesday, as disappointing inflation data from China and an overnight fall on Wall Street weighed.
The Hang Seng Index dropped 1.4% and the Shanghai Composite was down 0.2% after China released softer-than-expected June inflation data, with the consumer-price index up 2.3% from a year earlier, compared with an expected 2.4%, and slower than the 2.5% seen in May.
The latest inflation data, however, suggests investors will take a cautious approach ahead of trade data that will be released on Thursday and second-quarter growth figures that will come out next week.
The Nikkei 225 was down 0.3% as the index was hit by a stronger yen. Australia's S&P/ASX 200 lost 0.9% and South Korea's KOSPI fell 0.4%.
Markets in Indonesia will be closed on Wednesday, as up to 190 million voters cast ballots in a tightly held presidential race. Indonesia's JSX has been supported this year by expectations that Joko Widodo, whom investors consider to be pro-business, will win the election. The index gained a total of 2.4% on Monday and Tuesday, and is up 17.6% so far this year.
Overnight, U.S. stocks fell as investors avoided equities and remained on the sidelines ahead of the release of second-quarter earnings this week.
The Dow 30 fell 0.69%, the S&P 500 index fell 0.70%, while the NASDAQ Composite index fell 1.35%.
Many investors spent the day on the sidelines to await concrete revenue and profit numbers from a variety of sectors to help them verify whether stock prices have grown a little frothy thanks to years of loose monetary policy.
The Federal Reserve will release the minutes from its June policy meeting on Wednesday, and investors also avoided stocks ahead that as well, as uncertainty persists as to what the U.S. central bank will do with interest rates.
While the economy has shown some signs of improvement, markets still remain unclear as to how much time will pass from when the Fed will wrap up stimulus programs and when it will begin hiking benchmark interest rates.