Emerging markets stocks rose to their highest levels since August on Wednesday, led by gains in Chinese shares on positive economic data, while currencies remained steady as bets on U.S. interest rate cuts lingered.
The MSCI’s gauge of emerging market stocks advanced 1.0% by 0903 GMT, while a basket of currencies was up 0.1 percent against the dollar.China’s November industrial profits posted double-digit gains as overall manufacturing improved, although soft demand continued to constrain business growth expectations, emboldening calls for more macro policy support.
The benchmark Shanghai Composite index rose 0.5 percent, while the blue-chip CSI 300 index added 0.4 percent.
“On the domestic front, the impact of latest policy support measures on domestic industrial and consumer demand will take time to feed through,” J.P.Morgan economists said in a note.
“Fiscal and monetary policy will continue the growth-friendly policy stance, but the probability of bolstered policy stimulus is low,” J.P.Morgan added.
Hong Kong shares recovered, gaining 1.7 percent on a rally in gaming firms after regulators vowed to make improvements to proposed draft rules that had sent their stocks plunging.
Investor appetite for risky emerging markets assets also gathered pace as the U.S. Federal Reserve’s dovish stance and a softer inflation report last week fuelled bets of rate cuts as early as March.
The MSCI’s stocks index is set for gains of over 5 percent for this year and poised to snapping two years of declines, while the currencies index is on track for a 4 percent gain, recovering from last year’s losses.
In Central and Eastern Europe, the Hungarian forint and Polish zloty were little changed against the euro, while the Czech crown fell 0.4 percent, with no major economic data releases scheduled in these countries.
The Turkish lira touched fresh lows of 29.3915 per dollar.Russia’s rouble was little changed against the greenback ahead of a batch of economic data due later in the day.
On the data front, Israel’s industrial output and Argentina’s retail sales are due later in the day.
