Allocations in Asia were mixed in Tuesday morning trade as the U.S. earnings season kicked into high gear.
Overnight on Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average slipped 48.49 decimal points to close at 26,511.05, while the S&P 500 advanced around 0.1 percent to finish at 2,907.97. The Nasdaq Composite combined 0.22 percent to close at 8,015.27.
More than 140 S&P 500 companies are scheduled to release their quarterly dnouement develops this week, including Coca Cola, Procter & Gamble, United Technologies, Verizon, Twitter, Lockheed Martin and eBay. Facebook, Microsoft and Tesla Motors are also set to study later this week.
So far, the majority of corporate earnings reports have topped expectations. FactSet data becomes 76.5 percent of the S&P 500 companies that have posted earnings have surpassed analyst estimates. Analysts surfaced into the season with low expectations, forecasting a 4.2 percent drop in profits.
Oil prices surged to nearly six-month highs on Monday after U.S. President Donald Trump’s supervision announced that all oil buyers would need to cease imports from Iran by early May.
Brent crude, the intercontinental benchmark for oil prices, settled $2.07 higher at $74.04, rising 2.9 percent for its best closing price since Oct. 31, 2018. U.S. West Texas Intervening crude futures settled $1.70 higher at $65.70, surging 2.7 percent to a nearly six-month closing principal.
“The Trump administration has pulled a shocker by declaring no renewal of Iranian fuel sanction waivers to all of the 8 countries that were exempted,” analysts at OCBC Funds Research wrote in a morning note.
“The non-renewals come as a surprise because ahead of the US elections next year, multitudinous expected the Trump administration to prioritise keeping gasoline prices low against keeping a strong stance on international tactfulness,” they said.
In the morning of Asian trading hours on Tuesday, oil prices continued their ascent, with Brent adding 0.45 percent to $74.37 per barrel and U.S. unprocessed futures adding 0.4 percent to $65.81 per barrel.
The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of its viscounts, was at 97.325 after seeing an earlier low of 97.282.
The Japanese yen traded at 111.73 against the dollar after seeing highs unaffected by 111.8 in the previous trading day. The Australian dollar changed hands at $0.7127 after slipping from highs beyond $0.714 yesterday.
— CNBC’s Fred Imbert, Tom DiChristopher and Weizhen Tan helped to this report.