Asian stocks drop following turbulent trading on Wall 
Street

• Asian stocks ex-Hang Seng are on the defensive following the overnight drop in the US equities.
• US 10-year yield recovers slightly from two-year lows.

Most Asian equity markets are trading in the red this Friday morning, possibly tracking the slide in the US stocks in the overnight trade. 

The Shanghai Composite is currently reporting marginal losses but other regional heavyweights like Japan’s Nikkei and Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 are down at least 0.60% each. 

South Korea’s Kospi is down close to 0.90%, while bucking the bearish trend is Hong Kong’s Hang Seng, up 0.25% on the day. 

Japanese stocks in particular are facing a double whammy of escalating trade tensions and the resulting rise in the Japanese Yen. 

Oil benchmarks are flashing green with Brent trading 0.6% higher on the day at $68.50, having dropped as much as 5.6 per cent on Thursday on rising US inventories.

Meanwhile, the yield one the 10-year US treasury note is trading largely unchanged on the day at 2.32% – up three basis points from the low of 2.29% hit yesterday. That was the lowest level since 2017. 

The yield has managed to gain some ground, possibly due to a 0.30% in the S&P 500 futures. The index fell 1.19% on Thursday courtesy of mounting concerns over Sino-US trade tensions.