Asian stocks muted, tech falls ahead of TSMC earnings
investing.comInvesting.com — Most Asian stocks firmed slightly on Thursday, although local technology shares were sold off on weak cues from Wall Street, and as investors turned wary of the sector ahead of earnings from chipmaking giant TSMC.
Regional technology stocks took a weak lead-in from Wall Street, as Netflix Inc (NASDAQ:NFLX) reported disappointing earnings and Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) clocked shrinking margins. Focus is now on quarterly results from chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (TW:2330) (NYSE:TSM), or TSMC, to gauge how global chip demand fared in the past three months.
TSMC is expected to clock a 27% decline in quarterly profits, and a 13% drop in revenue, according to a Reuters poll. Shares of the world’s largest chipmaker by production were flat, while the Taiwan Weighted index rose slightly.
Other tech-heavy indexes also came under pressure from weak U.S. signals. South Korea’s KOSPI was flat, with chipmakers SK Hynix Inc (KS:000660) and Samsung Electronics (OTC:SSNLF) Co Ltd (KS:005930) down 1.3% and 0.6%, respectively.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 was the worst performer in Asia for the day, down 1.2% on steep losses in major technology stocks. Semiconductor testing equipment maker Advantest Corp (TYO:6857) was the biggest decliner on the Nikkei, losing 4.4%, amid uncertainty ahead of TSMC’s results.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index shed 0.2%, with losses in heavyweight technology firms largely offsetting a mild recovery in battered property stocks.
China’s Shanghai Shenzhen CSI 300 and Shanghai Composite indexes fell 0.1% and 0.2%, respectively, extending losses into a fourth straight session after soft gross domestic product data earlier this year.
Futures for India’s Nifty 50 index pointed to a weak open for local
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