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Shares fell in Asia on Wednesday after US stocks took their biggest loss in five months. The sell-off overnight on Wall Street was spurred by obstacles to a health care bill backed by President Donald Trump that also raised questions over prospects for his agenda of boosting growth by cutting taxes and regulations.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 stock index fell 2 percent to 19,071.35 and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index dropped 1.2 percent to 24,306.52. Australia’s S&P ASX 200 lost 1.5 percent to 5,685.60. South Korea’s Kospi lost 0.9 percent to 2,159.75 and the Shanghai Composite index fell 0.3 percent to 3,250.61.
Banks plunged as bond yields continued to fall, which will mean lower interest rates on loans. Transportation companies including airlines, railroads and rental car companies dropped. So did materials companies like steel and chemicals makers and small-company stocks that stand to benefit the most from Trump’s policy proposals of lower taxes and looser regulations. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index tumbled 1.1 percent to 2,344.02, its biggest drop since Oct. 11. The Dow Jones industrial average also lost 1.1 percent, to 20,668.01.
The Nasdaq composite shed 1.8 percent to 5,793.83. Four-fifths of the stocks on the New York Stock Exchange fell.
The US House of Representatives is scheduled to vote Thursday on the Republican-backed American Health Care Act, but it’s not clear if the House or the Senate will approve the bill. “The Trump administration’s 100 days of action appear to be becoming 100 days of inaction as investors start running out of patience,†Jeffrey Halley, senior market analyst at OANDA, said in a commentary.
Japanese shares sank after the US dollar weakened against the yen, potentially hurting earnings of exporters. The government’s report that Japan’s trade surplus more than doubled in February from a year earlier as exports to Asia surged failed to make up for the yen’s gains, which inevitably result in losses for the benchmark Nikkei 225 index.
Benchmark US crude lost 8 cents to $48.16 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It fell 67 cents to $48.24 a barrel on Tuesday. Brent crude, used to price international oils, fell 5 cents to $50.91 a barrel. It closed down 66 cents, or 1.3 percent, to $50.96 a barrel in London. The dollar slipped to 111.56 yen from 112.58 yen. The euro rose to $1.0794 from $1.0733.