Investing.com - Asian shares traded lower on Tuesday as investors focused anew on prospects for a Federal Reserve rate hike in September.
The Shanghai Composite eased 0.40% and the S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.73%, while the Nikkei 225 was down 0.67%.
Earlier, the NAB business confidence survey for July in Australia showed a plus-4, down from plus-8 in June on business confidence and to plus-6, from plus-10 on conditions with the outlook for employment weighing.
Overnight, U.S. stocks were higher after the close on Monday, as gains in the Oil & Gas, Basic Materials and Telecoms sectors led shares higher.
At the close in NYSE, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1.39%, while the S&P 500 index added 1.28%, and the NASDAQ Composite index added 1.16%.
Also comments from a prominent Federal Reserve official on the timing of the U.S. Central Bank's first interest rate hike in nearly a decade caught investor attention.
Fed governor Stanley Fischer insisted on Monday that lift-off for a September rate is not a certainty, in spite of solid numbers last week from the U.S. Department of Labor's July national economic situation report. In an exclusive interview with Bloomberg, Fischer indicated that while the labor market is moving closer to full employment, inflation still remains below the levels needed to allow the Fed to normalize policy.
On Friday, the Labor Department said the number of non-farm payrolls in the nation during the month of July increased by 215,000, in line with consensus estimates of a 212,000 gain. The figure received a boost from a 60,000 gain in Trade & Transportation jobs, as well as a 40,000 increase in Professional & Business service positions. The Labor Department also upwardly revised non-farm payrolls for June by 8,000 to 231,000. Fischer is widely considered the second-highest ranking official at the Fed behind chair Janet Yellen.
"The interesting situation in which we are is that employment has been rising pretty fast relative to previous performance and yet inflation is very low," Fischer told Bloomberg. "And the concern about the situation is not to move before we see inflation as well as employment returning to more normal levels."