Asia-Pacific markets lost steam mid-morning on Monday, with Hong Kong shares down more than 2%.
That was despite improved sentiment around coronavirus vaccine rollouts and U.S. stimulus hopes, which fueled a record-setting session Friday on Wall Street.
Australia’s benchmark ASX 200 was up 0.36%, trimming some of its earlier gains of more than 1%. Energy and mining stocks were mostly up — shares of Rio Tinto rose 2.03%, Woodside Petroleum was up 0.33%, Fortescue was up 3.76% and BHP added 1.87%.
Japanese markets struggled for gains: The Nikkei 225 gave up early gains to trade down 0.4% while the Topix index also fell 0.47%. South Korea’s Kospi index reversed gains to trade down 0.15%.
Chinese mainland shares fell: The Shanghai composite was down 0.74%, the Shenzhen composite declined 0.31% and the Shenzhen component dropped 0.48%.
In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng index fell 2.1%. Major indexes in Indonesia, Malaysia and Philippines traded up.
Singapore’s Straits Times Index fell 0.25% on Monday. Shares of Singapore Telecommunications rose 5.13% after the telco, along with tech company Grab, last week won a license to operate a digital bank in Singapore.
