NEW YORK, 17th May, 2024 (WAM) -- World shares were mostly lower on Friday, though Chinese stocks reversed earlier losses following the announcement of fresh measures to revive the ailing property market, Associated Press reported.
U.S. futures were little changed, with the contract for the Dow Jones Industrial Average near 40,000 after it topped that level for the first time on Thursday.
In early European trading, Germany's DAX lost 0.5 percent to 18,648.35 and the CAC 40 in Paris shed 0.5 percent to 8,147.13. Britain's FTSE 100 declined 0.3 percent to 8,413.99.
China’s central bank said Friday that it was reducing required down payments for housing loans and cutting interest rates for the first and second home purchases, among other moves.
The government was due to hold a news conference on property policies later Friday.
Hong Kong's Hang Seng jumped 1.1 percent to 19,591.29 and the Shanghai Composite index surged 1 percent to 3,154.03.
Property developers were among the biggest winners.
Shares in China Evergrande Group jumped nearly 18 percent, while China Vanke, another property conglomerate, jumped 19.6 percent.
But while the renewed effort to get property sales back on track was welcomed in China, faster growth could slow efforts in other parts of the world to tame inflation if it adds to upward pressure on commodity prices, said Ipek Ozkardeskaya of Swissquote.
“Chinese growth will mostly be driven by robust government support to industrial production rather than improved consumer-based demand, but it doesn’t really matter who drives growth for the prices of global commodities," she said in a commentary.
In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 declined 0.3 percent to 38,787.38, while Australia's S&P/ASX 200 gave up 0.9 percent to 7,814.40.
South Korea's Kospi fell 1 percent to 2,724.62.
On Thursday, the Dow slipped 0.1 percent to 39,869.38 after topping 40,000. The S&P 500 index, which is much more widely followed on Wall Street, dipped 0.2 percent and the Nasdaq composite fell 0.3 percent. All three had rallied on Wednesday to all-time highs.
Stronger-than-expected profit reports have been one of the main reasons U.S. stock indexes have broadly jumped through May to records following a tough April. Another has been revived hopes that the Federal Reserve will be able to cut its main interest rate at least once this year. The Fed has been keeping its federal funds rate at the highest level in more than two decades.
A string of worse-than-expected reports on inflation at the start of the year had put the potential for such cuts in jeopardy, but some more encouraging data has since arrived.
One report Thursday showed slightly more workers applied for unemployment benefits last week than economists expected, though the number remains low compared with history. Others said manufacturing growth in the mid-Atlantic region was weaker than hoped and import prices rose more than forecast.
In other trading early Friday, benchmark U.S. crude oil was up 20 cents at US$79.43 per barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, added 34 cents to US$83.61 per barrel.
The U.S. dollar rose to 155.83 Japanese yen from 155.40 yen. The euro slipped to US$1.0855 from US$1.0868.