Asian markets showed diverse reactions on Wednesday due to improved sentiment towards technology stocks and U.S. inflation data. Despite a significant recovery in the technology sector, new data indicating rising inflation and the possibility of interest rate hikes in the near future raised concerns among investors.
Growth of Technology Stocks and the Impact of Inflation Data
Technology stocks saw an increase this week due to opportunistic buying following last week's sharp decline. This rise was also influenced by a report from data center operator CoreWeave, which announced that its sales would reach $13 to $13.3 billion this year. These results exceeded expectations and alleviated concerns about the company's ability to finance its heavy debts.
New information from Anthropic, the maker of the AI agent Claude, also helped boost investor confidence. The company announced plans to raise up to $64 billion in its upcoming initial public offering (IPO), which would value it at $1.4 trillion. It was expected that the company would raise up to $100 billion, making it the largest IPO in history.
Concerns Over Interest Rate Hikes
However, concerns about larger-than-expected interest rate hikes by the Federal Reserve at its December meeting affected market sentiment. Consumer prices in the U.S. rose by 0.4% in October, which was less than the 0.6% increase in September but still above the expected 0.3%. The President of the Chicago Federal Reserve, Austan Goolsbee, described the report as "a concerning and borderline disturbing report."
In the oil market, prices slightly increased after a decline on Tuesday, due to hopes for a U.S.-Iran agreement to end the war and reopen the Strait of Hormuz. Brent crude prices reached around $92 per barrel.
At 02:30 GMT, the Tokyo Nikkei 225 index rose by 0.8% to 60,942.48, while the Hong Kong Hang Seng index fell by 0.8% to 24,368.21.
