Asian shares were mixed and oil traded below $80 a barrel as markets awaited details on a US-Iran interim deal and the Federal Reserve's policy decision. Japan's Nikkei rose on strong export data, while South Korea and Hong Kong fell.
A currency trader stretches near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, June 17, 2026.
Currency traders work near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, June 17, 2026.
– Asian shares were mixed and oil was trading below $80 a barrel on Wednesday as markets watched for details on the interim agreement between the U.S. and Iran to end the U.S. futures edged higher ahead of the Federal Reserve’s policy decision announcement and after Wall Street closed mixed near their record highs. Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 was 0.8% higher at 69,926.08 near its all-time high set this week, after official data showed Japan’s exports jumped 17% in May from a year earlier, helped in part by strong demand for high-tech products.
South Korea’s Kospi edged 0.2% lower to 8,706.10 with losses in big technology stocks tracking a sell-off of artificial intelligence-related shares on Wall Street. Samsung Electronics, the country’s most valuable company, fell 1.9%. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng lost 0.8% to 24,273.95, while the Shanghai Composite index slipped 0.1% to 4,089.26. Brent crude, the international standard, traded 0.3% lower at $78.76 per barrel early Wednesday after falling more than 5% on Tuesday.
It was still elevated compared to the roughly $70 a barrel level in late February before the war started.
“Normalizing flows will take time,” economists at HSBC wrote in a note this week. “Hurdles include mine clearance, insurance reinstatement, emptying excess Gulf oil storage, repositioning ships, and restarting idled production fields. ”U.S. President Donald Trump has been pressing the Fed for lower rates to help stimulate the U.S. economy, but fresh worries are rising on worsening inflation over the Iran war-caused energy shock. Analysts are broadly expecting that the Fed will keep the benchmark rate unchanged.
In the bond market, the yield on the U.S. 10-year Treasury fell to below 4.44% from 4.47% late Monday.
“With weak wage growth and rent growth, underlying forces are pointing to inflation falling sharply once the energy price shock recedes. We don’t expect the Fed to hike rates in 2026,” Preston Caldwell, chief U.S. economist at Morningstar wrote in a commentary. On Tuesday, Wall Street's benchmark S&P 500 fell 0.6% to 7,511.35 after setting an all-time high earlier this month, the Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.6% to 51.999.67, hitting another all-time high.
The technology-heavy Nasdaq composite dropped 1.2% to 26,376.34 following losses of some big tech stocks over renewed worries about an AI bubble. SpaceX, Elon Musk’s rocket company, was up 4.8%, gaining for the third straight day since its Wall Street debut. Yum Brands was up 1.9%, after it announced it is selling Pizza Hut for $2.7 billion with most restaurants purchased by private equity firm LongRange Capital.
In other dealings early Wednesday, the U.S. dollar fell to 160.30 Japanese yen from 160.42 yen. The euro was trading at $1.1612, up from $1.1608. Copyright 2026 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
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