Australia stocks break past year low, Aussie dollar weakens to 12-month low.
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 breached its one-year low on Thursday, falling 0.88% in the morning session to hit a low of 6,777.5 points, lower than the 6,785.7 seen on Oct. 28, 2022.
This comes a day after the country’s third-quarter inflation rate came in higher than expected.
Separately, the Australian dollar also weakened 0.55% against the U.S. dollar to reach its lowest level in over a year at 0.6275. The next lowest level was recorded at 0.6196 on Oct. 14, 2022.
— Lim Hui Jie
Japan, South Korean stocks fall over 2%
Stock indexes in Japan and South Korea plunged over 2% on Thursday as investors took cues from Wall Street overnight.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 fell 2.13%. South Korea’s Kospi index slipped 2.20% to its lowest level since early January.
South Korea’s Kosdaq index tumbled over 3%. Shares of South Korean tech stocks were also pressured by a 3.63% fall in chipmaker SK Hynix after its announced quarterly results.
Investors also assessed data from South Korea that showed the economy grew at a slightly higher-than-expected pace in the third quarter.
— Shreyashi Sanyal
SK Hynix shares fall 3.92% after third quarter results
Shares of South Korean chip supplier SK Hynix fell 3.92% after the firm announced a 2.18 trillion won ($1.61 billion) net loss for its third quarter, in contrast to a 1.11 trillion won net profit in the same period a year ago.
Revenue fell 17% year on year to come in at 9.07 trillion won. The company also recorded an operating loss of 1.79 trillion won compared to an operating profit of 1.66 trillion won in the third quarter of 2022.
However, SK Hynix highlighted that on a quarter on quarter basis, its losses narrowed as its net loss and operating loss shrank 27% and 38% respectively compared to the second quarter.
“With the effect of the production reduction by global memory providers starting to be seen and customers, following efforts to reduce inventories, placing new orders now, semiconductor prices are starting to stabilize,” the company said.
— Lim Hui Jie
Ford shares pop 2% after auto giant reaches a deal with UAW
The United Auto Workers and Ford Motor agreed in principle to the terms of a tentative deal that could conclude a labor strike at the automaker, sources confirmed to CNBC.
A tentative agreement could be announced as early as Wednesday evening, pending approval of union leaders, two sources told CNBC. UAW members had been on strike since mid-September.
Shares of Ford ticked up by 2.5% in after-hours trading. The automaker is slated to issue its third-quarter results on Thursday after the close.
Read more about the ongoing labor negotiations here.
–Darla Mercado, Mike Wayland
Beleaguered utilities are the sole winning sector in October
It’s been a rough 2023 for utilities, but the troubled sector is the only one in the S&P 500 that’s positive for the month.
Utilities are off nearly 16% this year, but they’ve managed to eke out a gain of 0.66% in October. The sector is also on pace for weekly gains, joined by consumer discretionary. The other nine sectors are heading for losses on the week.
Big winners in the utilities space this week include NextEra Energy, up about 8.7% in the period, and AES Corp, up 6.2%.
Utilities are beloved by income-focused investors for their dividend payments, but they have fallen on hard times as interest rates rise. This subjects companies to higher financing costs and stresses the balance sheets of companies that are already leveraged.
–Darla Mercado, Nick Wells
Meta shares fall in after-hours trading, reversing earnings-fueled gains
Shares of Meta dropped 3.1% in post-market trading after the Facebook parent’s CFO Susan Li said the company is seeing softer ad spending coming into the fourth quarter.
The stock had initially jumped more than 2% on Meta’s earnings report Wednesday, which gave better-than-expected results for the third quarter as revenue increased 23%, the fastest rate of growth since 2021. The company also lowered its fourth-quarter guidance, however, expecting revenue to come out between $36.5 to $40 billion, while analysts surveyed by FactSet expected $38.84 billion.
Li said Meta has observed the softer ad spending correlating with the start of the Middle East conflict, as the Israel-Hamas war enters its third week.
“We’ve been seeing continued strong advertiser demand in key segments including online commerce and gaming but having said that, we are also seeing more volatility at the start of the quarter,” Li said. “That’s in part why we widened our guidance range to capture that uncertainty.”
The executive noted that although the company cannot attribute demand softness to any geopolitical event with certainty, Meta has historically seen broader demand softness follow other regional conflicts, such as the Russia-Ukraine war.
— Pia Singh, Stephen Desaulniers