Live updates on U.S. CPI, China inflation

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index fell more than 2%, dragged by the consumer cyclicals sector.

Leading the index’s losses is e-commerce giant JD.com, which slumped as much as 12% to its lowest in a year. Chow Tai Fook Jewelry fell 5.19%, and Haidilao lost 4.18%. Automobile company Zhongsheng Group was down 4.94%.

Other index heavyweights are also in the red. Baidu is down 5.17%, while Alibaba and Meituan are lower by 3.44% and 3.89% respectively.

Other stocks dragging down the index include China Merchants Bank which fell 1.27%, while Ping An Insurance  lost 1.67%. HSBC Holdings also dropped 1.42%.

— Lee Ying Shan

JD.com shares tumbled to its lowest in a year, hit by a series of broker downgrades and target price revisions on the prospect of weaker retail growth for the Chinese e-commerce giant.

JD.com shares sank 12.1% to HK$27.83 in early Friday trade in Hong Kong, underperforming the 2.1% loss on the benchmark Hang Seng Index. JD.com’s losses this year have halved its market capitalization from the start of the year.

Morgan Stanley analysts downgraded JD.com to equal-weight from overweight, while Jeffries slashed its price target for JD.com’s Nasdaq listing from $97 to $80 per share.

— Lee Ying Shan

China reported a smaller-than-expected decline in exports in September compared to a year ago, while imports missed, according to customs data released Friday.

Exports fell by 6.2% last month from a year ago, less than Reuters’ forecast of a 7.6% drop. Similarly, imports also fell by 6.2% in U.S.-dollar terms in September compared to a year ago — slightly more than the 6% decline expected by the Reuters poll.

China’s exports have fallen on a year-on-year basis every month this year starting in May. The last positive print for imports on a year-on-year basis was in September last year.

For more, please read this story.

—Evelyn Cheng, Lee Ying Shan

China’s consumer prices came in flat in September, while factory gate prices saw annual declines slow for a third month.

The consumer price index was flat on an annual basis in September, data from the National Bureau of Statistics showed. It was below the median estimate for a 0.2% increase in a Reuters poll.

China’s producer price index fell 2.5% from a year earlier, weaker than economists’ expectations for a 2.4% decline.

Tepid prices underscore what China’s top leaders labeled as a “tortuous” economic recovery after the country emerged from its draconian zero Covid curbs toward the end of last year.

— Clement Tan, Lee Ying Shan

Singapore’s central bank kept its monetary policy unchanged for a second straight meeting, maintaining the rate of appreciation of its Singapore dollar nominal effective exchange rate policy band.

The Singapore central bank manages monetary policy through exchange rate settings, rather than interest rates.

It guides the Singapore dollar against an undisclosed basket of currencies of its major trading partners, adjusting the pace of its appreciation or depreciation by tweaking the slope, width and center of the currency band. The Monetary Authority of Singapore does not disclose any detail relating to this band.

Core inflation in the Southeast Asian city-state came in at 3.4% year-on-year for the month of August, easing from July’s figures.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore is expecting core inflation to “step down further to between 2.5% – 3.0% year-on-year by December,” it said in a statement Friday. “Prospects for the Singapore economy are muted in the near term but should improve gradually in H2 2024.”

— Lee Ying Shan

Singapore’s GDP grew faster than expected and expanded 0.7% year-on-year in the third quarter, advanced estimates from the government showed.

The construction sector grew 6% year-on-year, extending the 7.7% growth in the previous quarter.

“Growth was supported by expansions in both public and private sector construction output,” a statement from the Ministry of Trade and Industry said.

Conversely, Singapore’s manufacturing sector contracted 5%. Its weak performance was owed to output declines across all manufacturing clusters, with the exception of the transport engineering cluster.

On a quarter-on-quarter seasonally adjusted basis, Singapore’s GDP grew 1%, faster than the previous quarter’s 0.1% expansion.

— Lee Ying Shan

India’s inflation data rose 5.02% year-on-year for September, easing to a three-month low on the back of lower vegetable prices.

The reading came in below expectations of a 5.5% increase by economists polled by Reuters, and still remains above central bank’s target of 4%.

Just last week, the Reserve Bank of India kept interest rates steady at 6.5%.

— Lee Ying Shan

Thursday’s consumer price report for September was “modestly hotter-than-expected” and insufficient to stop the Federal Reserve from raising rates one more time before the end of 2023, according to Wolfe Research chief investment strategist Chris Senyek.

“Our sense is that the FOMC will need to see core inflation break below 4% and believe it will continue to trend downward to pause and remain on hold for a prolonged period,” Senyek wrote to clients.

Over the medium, Senyek believes the lagged effect of the Fed’s rate hikes since March 2022 will eventually “spark economic disappointments, rising recession concerns and a downward EPS revision cycle in the months ahead,” and that declining interest rates will be insufficient to offset the downward bias.

— Scott Schnipper, Michael Bloom

Stronger economic growth, accelerating government spending and a bottoming out of inflation are just some reasons why many analysts are bullish on India — and asset management firm AllianceBernstein is no exception.

The analysts expect the South Asian country to give “one of the highest returns among key markets throughout the world for the next several years.”

AllianceBernstein revealed some of its favorite stocks in the country, including two new names on its radar.

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— Amala Balakrishner

Artificial intelligence-related stocks have rallied as the theme gained traction this year, with investors piling into favorites such as Nvidia and Microsoft.

But according to Deepwater Asset Management, there’s one under-the-radar AI stock that will be essential for the long-term infrastructure rollout of artificial intelligence.

CNBC Pro subscribers can read more here.

— Weizhen Tan

Oil prices bounced back on Thursday, with futures for U.S. benchmark West Texas Intermediate crude rising 1.6% to trade just below the $85 per barrel mark. The move erased some of Wednesday’s declines, the price of oil still remains below Monday’s high and levels from late September, when WTI traded above $90 per barrel.

Helima Croft, RBC Capital Markets commodities strategist, said on “Squawk on the Street” that a report showing a surprising gasoline build in the United States last week is helping to keep prices in check despite the fears that the Israel-Hamas war could expand and disrupt the global oil supply.

“The question is what’s going to win out this year. This broader concern about the macro backdrop — potential demand softness — or questions about the security of supply,” Croft said.

— Jesse Pound

Birkenstock‘s recent initial public offering (IPO) is expected to help boost shares of a British footwear brand, according to Investec analysts.

German shoe brand Birkenstock’s debut on the New York Stock Exchange earlier this week has given investors and analysts insight into the financials and metrics of a sizeable single-brand footwear company for the first time. Using this information as a benchmark, Investec analysts believe that there is significant growth potential for a London-listed stock that the market may be underestimating.

CNBC Pro subscribers can read more here.

— Ganesh Rao