Asia shares ease after run of gains; oil lifted by OPEC cut extension hopes

Reuters: Asian stock markets took a breather on Friday from their recent surge as investors booked profits, while the dollar inched up after Thursday’s slide and optimism over possible renewed supply cuts by OPEC lifted oil prices.

Financial spreadbetter CMC Markets expects Britain’s FTSE 100 to start the day flat, Germany’s DAX to be slightly higher and France’s CAC 40 to be marginally lower, with markets failing to recover Thursday’s losses.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan pulled back 0.2%, on track to end the week up 1.2%, its fourth straight weekly gain.

Overnight, Wall Street lost momentum, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average barely eking out its sixth straight record high, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq snapped a seven-day winning streak as investors slowed buying to digest recent gains. U.S. President Donald Trump’s first solo news conference on Thursday, where he adopted a combative stance against the news media and deflected questions about contacts between his presidential campaign and Russian operatives, also gave investors pause.

Until Thursday, the index had beaten its previous intraday highs for seven consecutive sessions, and closed at 19-month highs in the past two.

A batch of positive economic data out of Asia this week, driven by improving exports and rising commodity prices, has bolstered shares, although concerns linger that any protectionist threats posed by Trump could reverse the recovery.

On Friday, Singapore revised its fourth-quarter gross domestic product growth sharply higher. Earlier in the week, Taiwan raised its 2017 economic growth target to a three-year high, Indonesia’s January exports rose at the fastest pace in more than five years and China’s January inflation picked up by more than expected to near six-year highs.

Japan’s Nikkei closed 0.6% lower, down 0.7% for the week. Australian shares fell 0.2% at the close, shrinking the week’s gains to 1.5%.

Chinese shares slipped after earlier touching a near two-month high after the securities regulator said that, starting Friday, it will relax certain rules on stock index futures trading as restrictions imposed during the 2015 stock market crash are unwound.

The CSI 300 index lost 0.4% after gaining as much as 0.5%, on track for a weekly advance of the same magnitude.

Hong Kong shares dropped 0.7%, but are still poised to close up 1.6% for the week.

The dollar edged up, but remained near the one-week low hit on Thursday, when it posted its biggest one-day drop in more than two weeks, as uncertainty about the timing of the next Federal Reserve rate hike offset the impact of stronger economic data.

The dollar climbed almost 0.2% on Friday to 113.41 yen, up by the same percentage for the week. It lost about 0.8% on Thursday.

The dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of trade-weighted peers, was fractionally higher at 100.49, on track to end the week 0.3% lower. It tumbled 0.7% on Thursday.

The euro was little changed at $1.0671 on Friday, retaining Thursday’s 0.7% gain, and set to end the week 0.3% higher.

The stronger dollar on Friday weighed on gold, which slipped 0.1% to $1,237.36 an ounce. But the precious metal remains poised for a 0.3% rise for the week.

Oil prices built on Thursday’s gains, driven by a report that the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries may consider extending its oil supply-reduction pact with non-members and may even apply deeper cuts if inventories don’t fall to a targeted level.

Global benchmark Brent crude advanced 0.1% to $55.74, narrowing the week’s loss to 1.7%.