Bank of Japan decision, China PMI, Samsung earnings report | Real Time Headlines

Asia-Pacific markets fell on Thursday as investors focused on the Bank of Japan’s interest rate decision and key business activity data from China.

Economists polled by Reuters expect the Bank of Japan to keep interest rates at 0.25%, but the statement will be parsed for any clues on the timing of the next rate hike.

In China, the National Bureau of Statistics will release China’s official Purchasing Managers Index for September. The manufacturing PMI is expected to be 49.9, with the contraction slowing down from 49.8 last month.

Still, this would be the sixth straight month of contraction in the country’s manufacturing sector.

Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 Index It fell 0.33%, while the broad-based Topix fell 0.36%.

Korean Cospi It fell 1.33%, leading Asian stocks lower, while the small-cap Kosdaq index fell 1.25%. Investors will focus on heavyweight Samsung Electronics Co.’s third-quarter earnings, expected to be released later on Thursday.

Australian S&P/ASX 200 Index It opened the day down 0.2%.

However, Hong Kong’s future Hang Seng Index The Hang Seng Index closed at 20,511 points, opening stronger than the Hang Seng Index’s closing point of 20,380.64 points.

Overnight, U.S. stocks fell as investors digested a slew of earnings reports and looked forward to more performance from big technology companies.

letter The company saw more than analysts expected Strong quarterly revenue growth from its cloud business. Shares rose nearly 3%. However, chipmaker stocks AMD fell more than 10% in the fourth quarter Income guidance Failed to impress investors.

tech giants apple and Amazon Depending on the results, it will be due on Thursday meta platform and Microsoft.

High-tech Nasdaq Index It fell 0.56% after rising to a new record high earlier. this S&P 500 Index down 0.33%, Dow Jones Industrial Average It fell 0.22% to close at 42,141.54 points.

—CNBC’s Hakyung Kim and Pia Singh contributed to this report.