Indonesia’s Jakarta Composite Index down on China and Japan Data
At the start of the week, Indonesia's benchmark stock index (the Jakarta Composite Index of IHSG) has the tendency to decline as market participants are eager to engage in profit taking. The release of China’s weak export data (resulting in a trade deficit) at the end of last week in combination with the widening current account deficit of Japan (and its slowing GDP growth) provided enough reasons for investors to opt for profit taking. Moreover, Asian stock markets were in the red and were thus unable to support the IHSG.
Indonesia’s IHSG fell 0.18 percent to 4,677.25 points on Monday (10/03).
Asian stock indices were under pressure today because of several weak economic data from the world’s second and third largest economies. In China, the trade balance turned into a deficit in February 2014 due to a significant drop in exports (-18.1 percent year-on-year) as well as slowing outstanding new yuan loan growth (which halved in February), while Japan’s gross domestic product (GDP) growth in the fourth quarter of 2013 at 0.7 percent was below expectations (1.0 percent). Market participants are concerned that these data indicate that the economies of China and Japan are still rather fragile. Moreover, if the giant economies of China and Japan are not growing as strong as expected, then it will also translate into lower growth of markets in the (Southeast) Asian region as these are dependent on the growth of the two big economies. Negative market sentiments were also caused by depreciating emerging market currencies.
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