Global traders are keeping their focus on the trade talks between the United States and China, with a highly-anticipated meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping scheduled to take place at the G-20 summit later this week. Asian shares were broadly lower in the early afternoon in Asia, with Chinese benchmarks seeing the steepest losses. The Shanghai Composite was down 1.82 percent as of 12:27 p.m. HK/SIN while the Shenzhen Composite lost 2.04 percent. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index eased 1.31 percent and Japan’s Nikkei 225 was down 0.50 percent. South Korea’s Kospi, down a modest 0.08 percent, and Australia’s ASX 200, down 0.09 percent, escaped the wilder losses seen elsewhere in Asia.
Also pressuring markets are expected comments from at least five Federal Reserve policy makers later on Tuesday, including Chairman Jerome Powell. Traders are expecting the Fed to maintain its recent dovish tone and to hint towards an upcoming interest rate hike which is expected as early as next month.
Bitcoin Rally Continues
As stock markets suffered from trader concerns, bitcoin prices continued to soar on Tuesday after surging more than 10 percent over the weekend on news that Facebook is planning to release a digital currency called Libra. Bitcoin briefly crossed the $11,000 mark on Monday before retreating, but it was firmly above that important level on Tuesday, trading at $11,155.40 just after noon in Hong Kong. The news of Facebook’s entry into the cryptocurrency sphere has created widespread awareness of the industry and indicated a continued interest of big business in using cryptocurrency, two factors that prompted the buying spree and sent prices higher. According to reports by Reuters, bitcoin prices also soared on expectations for ‘halving’ next year, a process in which mining incentives will be reduced which will naturally limit the supply of bitcoin. According to one analyst, bitcoin always jumps 200 percent a year before halving and has shown that it can climb even higher in the year after halving. Bitcoin prices have nearly doubled since March 2019.