BY ELAINE KURTENBACH
Shares fell Thursday in most Asian markets ahead of a key U.S. inflation report due Friday that might point the way ahead for interest rates.
Benchmarks fell more than 1% in Tokyo, Hong Kong and Sydney. Oil prices and U.S. futures also declined.
The markets’ big focus this week is on a U.S. government inflation report due Friday. The personal consumption expenditures index, or PCE, is the Federal Reserve’s preferred measure of inflation, and analysts said investors were in a wait-and-see posture after recent mixed data.
The latest updates on inflation could influence the central bank’s decision on when to begin cutting interest rates, which remain at their highest level in more than 20 years and which are having an impact worldwide.
In Asian trading, another set of measures to boost the Chinese property market failed to lift market sentiment. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 1.9% to
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