ASIA MARKETS: Asian Market Rally Shows Signs Of Slowing

Australia bucks the trend, but most other indexes pull back

The global stock rally showed signs of slowing Tuesday, with many Asia-Pacific indexes little changed ahead of the start of the Chinese Communist Party's congress.

One exception was Australia, where stocks rebounded thanks to stronger commodity prices. The S&P/ASX 200 was recently up 0.7% as it got a lift from Rio Tinto (RIO) and BHP Billiton (BHP.AU) . Their shares rose more than 1%, with Rio hitting another 3 1/2 -year high.

Japanese stocks were also off to a good start, with the Nikkei rising as much as 0.7%. But it struggled to stay in positive territory as the yen pulled back from session lows. The Nikkei was recently down 0.1%.

Indexes in Taiwan and New Zealand , which have been on 10-day winning streaks like Japan, were both down slightly for the session.

Monday's inflation data from China continued to be a market focus, said Chris Weston, chief market strategist at IG Markets. The report, which included higher-than-expected producer-price growth, helped to send money into copper, which reached fresh three-year highs, he said.

Meanwhile, stock-market traders are also "likely pre-positioning" ahead of China's third-quarter growth report, which is due Thursday, Weston said.

Elsewhere, Korea's Kospi index rose 0.1% as index heavyweight Samsung Electronics (005930.SE) rebounded 1.5%.

Crude prices were down slightly in Asian trading after some of Monday's gains were pared by yesterday's settlement. Oil stocks fell in Japan, though they rose in Australia.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 17, 2017 01:25 ET (05:25 GMT)