Asian stocks mostly lower on weak lead from US

China and Hong Kong stocks retreated Tuesday morning on profit-taking following strong rebounds over the past sessions, with investors unimpressed by China’s September trade data suggesting the economy remains under downward pressure.

The symbol for ABInBev appears at the post where it trades, on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Tuesday, October 13, 2015.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 fell 1.1 percent to 18,234.74 and South Korea’s Kospi was down 0.1 percent to 2,019.05.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan .MIAPJ0000PUS slipped 0.2 percent in early trade from their two-month high touched on Monday, though it was still up 8.6 percent so far this month. But stocks in Singapore were higher after preliminary data showed the country narrowly avoided a recession in the third quarter. Meanwhile, China’s weak trade data released Tuesday weighed on sentiment for a second day. It also drove down currencies of commodity-reliant countries such as Australia.

Bernard Aw, market strategist at IG Markets Singapore, said Monday’s price rise was bolstered after el-Badri said Sunday: “OPEC is confident that it will see a more balanced market in 2016”. Newly-released data shows that China’s exports fell 3.7 percent from a year earlier in September in dollar-denominated terms, while imports tumbled more than 20 percent.

On the whole, investors’ risk appetite has returned as they price out a chance of the U.S. Federal Reserve raising interest rates this year.

Wall Street fell with financial stocks among the largest decliners on the S&P 500, pressured by the expectation of lower interest rates for longer.

The US dollar’s weakness against other major currencies has not been helped by the latest comments from Fed officials.

The Dow Jones industrial average lost 71 points, or 0.4 percent, to 17,060. The Nasdaq composite climbed 0.2 percent to 4,838.64.

ENERGY: Benchmark US crude added 11 cents to $46.77 per barrel in electronic trading on New York Mercantile Exchange. On Monday, the contract dropped $2.53 to close at $47.10 a barrel after a report showed that OPEC members are keeping up production even after a big drop in prices. Brent crude, used to price worldwide oils, was down 3 cents to $49.66 a barrel in London.

CURRENCIES: The euro strengthened to $ $1.138 from $1.136, while the dollar weakened to 119.83 yen from 120.04 yen.

“The drop in oil prices has taken Treasury yields back down again, and tightening in the Treasury/Bund spread encourages euro/dollar to probe the top of the current range – $1.1460 is the key level… and a test looks likely”, said Societe Generale currency analysts in a client note on Tuesday.