Stocks retreat, US yields advance, dollar strengthens on hawkish Fed
By Xie Yu
HONG KONG (Reuters) — Asian stocks followed Wall Street's lead on Thursday, dipping across the board as investors interpreted the U.S. Federal Reserve's latest policy statements as signalling higher-for-longer interest rates.
MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was down 0.6%, with the Hong Kong benchmark shedding 0.8%. Japan's Nikkei fell 1%.
The yield on two-year U.S. Treasury notes rose to a 17-year high of 5.1970%.
«People were picking and choosing what they wanted to look at which was obviously more on the negative side, so I think sentiment today would lean more towards the red end,» said Ben Luk, senior multi-asset strategist at State Street (NYSE:STT) Global Markets.
The overall tone of the Fed's latest meeting was not overly hawkish but there were two surprises, he said.
Forecasts for 2024 were slightly higher than generally expected and Fed statements implied the view that macroeconomic growth would hold up even if with rates staying higher for longer, Luk said.
The U.S. central bank held interest rates on Wednesday and projected an increase by year-end, saying monetary policy is likely to be significantly tighter through 2024 than previously thought.
The median forecast for the federal funds rate is 5.1% by year-end, versus 4.6% estimated in June.
Even as inflation slows for the rest of 2023 and in coming years, the Fed anticipates only modest initial reductions to its policy rate.
Upward revisions to U.S. policymakers' median rate forecasts for the next couple of years triggered a rebound in the U.S. dollar, pushed U.S. Treasury yields to multi-year highs, flattened the yield curve and sent stocks tumbling.
The dollar index, which measures the currency against a basket of
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