Wednesday, October 9, 2024

5 Things You Need to Know to Start Your Day: Asia

Good morning. US stocks climb to another record high as Wall Street gears up for fresh inflation data. Tesla looks set to unveil prototypes

Good morning. US stocks climb to another record high as Wall Street gears up for fresh inflation data. Tesla looks set to unveil prototypes for its robotaxis. And Ratan Tata has died at the age of 86. Here's what's moving markets. —Isabelle Lee

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Watching CPI

Wall Street traders gearing up for key US inflation data pushed the S&P 500 to a new all-time high, with big tech stocks once again leading the charge. Treasury yields also moved higher, while the Bloomberg dollar index notched its eighth-straight day of gains on Wednesday. The  US consumer-price index due out Thursday is tipped to show year-on-year inflation slowed to 2.3% in September from 2.5% a month earlier, according to a Bloomberg survey of economists. The report has potential to sway investor views on how much easing the Federal Reserve will do after last week's blockbuster monthly jobs report prompted a pullback in market bets on supersized interest-rate reductions. Meanwhile, the newly released minutes of the Fed's last policy meeting showed that Chair Jerome Powell received some pushback on the half-point interest-rate cut that was implemented in September, with some officials preferring a smaller, quarter-point cut.

Tesla robotaxis

Tesla is set to finally unveil autonomous taxi prototypes late Thursday. Chief Executive Elon Musk has promised nothing short of a new era for transportation, in which Teslas with empty driver seats zip around with paying passengers, making money for their owners while they're asleep or at work. For all of Musk's years of premature predictions that autonomous Teslas were just around the corner, investors have bid up the company's shares in recent months in anticipation of a product that's actually ready, or at least close to it. Meeting those expectations will require credible plans to leapfrog the likes of Alphabet Inc.-backed Waymo, which leads a field of companies already offering driverless rides. Meanwhile, the company has just notched its best-ever quarter for China shipments, as vehicles delivered from its Shanghai factory rose for a third consecutive month.

Hurricane threat

Hurricane Milton churned toward Florida's west coast with winds powerful enough to demolish houses, threatening to unleash once-in-a-century flooding across some of the state's fastest-growing counties. It's forecast to raise the ocean water in Tampa Bay by as much as 12 feet (3.7 meters), and 13 feet on Anna Maria Island, inundating cities and towns. Those who live in the Sunshine State's most vulnerable areas have been implored to get out, with some 6 million residents living in counties that have issued mandatory evacuation orders, according to the Associated Press.

Biden-Netanyahu

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke with US President Joe Biden for the first time in more than a month as Washington seeks to temper Israel's retaliation for last week's missile attack from Iran. The offices of both leaders confirmed the call, which included Vice President Kamala Harris. A White House readout of the call didn't mention a likely Israeli strike. Instead it said Biden "affirmed his ironclad commitment to Israel's security" and "condemned unequivocally Iran's ballistic missile attack against Israel on October 1st." The conversation was the first time Biden and Netanyahu had spoken since August. In the weeks since then, Israel has launched a massive campaign to target the Iran-backed group Hezbollah in Lebanon, killing most of its senior leadership including Hassan Nasrallah as well as at least 1,500 people in air strikes. Iran fired about 200 ballistic missiles in response, which the US helped to defend against.

Ratan Tata

Ratan Tata, the businessman who inherited one of India's oldest conglomerates and transformed it through a string of eye-catching deals into a global empire, has died. He was 86. His death was announced in a statement by Tata Group Chairman Natarajan Chandrasekaran, who called Tata "a truly uncommon leader whose immeasurable contributions have shaped not only the Tata Group but also the very fabric of our nation." Through more than two dozen listed firms, the conglomerate makes products ranging from coffee and cars to salt and software, runs airlines and introduced India's first superapp.

What we've been reading

Here's what caught our eye over the past 24 hours: 

And finally, here's what Esha is interested in today

The US presidential election season is in full swing, and with that, talk about trade and tariffs. This is fairly familiar territory for equity traders. What has changed, however, is how the stock market is responding — or more accurately, not responding — to the threats.

Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Kamala Harris have both spoken about potential tariffs, though Trump has threatened much higher levels of levies if he wins in November.

A basket of shares created by UBS to monitor companies expected to lose from Trump's tariff plans has actually risen 7.8% over the past three months, more than double the S&P 500 Index's 3% gain, through Tuesday's close. A look at the shares of Deere, the farm equipment manufacturer who has been caught in the middle, has betrayed no panic, no knee-jerk selling.

It appears investors are looking past the tariff bluster and trying to separate political rhetoric from what will happen. Ultimately, Wall Street pros say the smartest approach for investors trying to navigate through all the tariff headlines is to hold off on any bold bets until more concrete details emerge. 

Esha Day reports on equity markets for Bloomberg in New York. 

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