GLOBAL MARKETS-Asian shares set to dip as investors await key data

By John McCrank
NEW YORK, Sept 14 (Reuters) - Asian shares looked set to
open lower on Tuesday as investors shifted focus to upcoming
data and central bank meetings although positive developments
around potential COVID-19 vaccines and increased deal activity
are likely to stem losses.
Australia's S&P/ASX 200 futures YAPcm1 were down 0.22% and
Hong Kong's Hang Seng index futures .HSI HSIc1 lost 0.08%.
Japan's Nikkei 225 futures NKc1 were flat after Chief Cabinet
Secretary Yoshihide Suga won a ruling party leadership election,
paving the way for him to succeed Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
E-mini futures for the S&P 500 EScv1 gained 0.11%.
On the economic data front, China's industrial production
and retail sales for August are expected to show an improving
economy later on Tuesday. Chinese house price data for August is
also due.
"The global economic recovery is currently being driven by
China's fast rebound," said Joseph Capurso, head of
international economics at Commonwealth Bank of Australia. "As a
result, market participants will likely be very sensitive to any
downside surprises to the Chinese data."
U.S. retail sales figures from August are due Wednesday.
Investors will also look to central banks for direction,
with the U.S. Federal Reserve starting a two-day policy meeting
on Tuesday, the first since unveiling a landmark shift to a more
tolerant stance on inflation in August. The Bank of Japan and
the Bank of England announce their respective policy decisions
on Thursday.
MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan
.MIAPJ0000PUS ended up 1.06%.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average .DJI closed up 1.18% and
the S&P 500 .SPX rose 1.27% while the tech-heavy Nasdaq
Composite .IXIC added 1.87%.
U.S. stocks rose after drugmaker AstraZeneca said it resumed
its British clinical trials of its COVID-19 vaccine, one of the
most advanced in development. Pfizer Inc and U.S.-listed shares
of Germany's BioNTech gained after proposing an expansion to
regulators for their phase 3 trial to about 44,000 participants.
Technology shares rallied after cloud services company
Oracle ORCL.N said it would team up with China's ByteDance to
keep TikTok operating in the United States, beating Microsoft
Corp MSFT.O in a deal structured as a partnership rather than
an outright sale. Elsewhere, SoftBank Group jumped 8.96% to mark its biggest
daily gain since March 25, after the company said it would sell
chip designer Arm to Nvidia Corp for as much as $40 billion in a
deal set to reshape the semiconductor landscape. The U.S. dollar =USD dropped 2.2% against a basket of
currencies, hitting a two-week low versus the yen, as demand for
the safe haven currency eased amid the rise in equities.
U.S. crude CLc1 recently rose 0.35% to $37.39 per barrel.