In This Article:
* Asian stock markets : https://tmsnrt.rs/2zpUAr4
* Shanghai shares lead Asia lower on Sino-US trade unease
* Wagers on more dovish Fed talk keep yields, dollar down
* Gold extends gains as rates and dollar drop
By Wayne Cole
SYDNEY, June 25 (Reuters) - Asian shares were haunted by trade anxiety Tuesday while the risk of more dovish talk from the Federal Reserve pushed down Treasury yields and the dollar, propelling gold to fresh six-year peaks.
Investors are waiting anxiously to see if anything comes of Sino-U.S. trade talks later this week and sentiment was not helped by reports U.S. President Donald Trump would be content with "any outcome".
Trump is slated to meet one-on-one with at least eight world leaders at the G20 summit in Osaka, including China's President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Chinese investors seemed none too hopeful as Shanghai blue chips slipped 1.8%. That led MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan down 0.5%.
Japan's Nikkei lost 0.6%, while E-Mini futures for the S&P 500 edged down 0.3%. EUROSTOXX 50 futures were off 0.2% ahead of the European open.
Wall Street had been just as cautious with the Dow ending Monday up 0.03%, while the S&P 500 lost 0.17% and the Nasdaq 0.32%.
There are no less than five Fed policy makers speaking on Tuesday, including Chair Jerome Powell, and markets assume they will stick with the recent dovish message.
"It's always possible the chair could walk back some of the market's dovish interpretation of last week's FOMC meeting...but we suspect he will reinforce the message laid out last week," said Kevin Cummins, a senior U.S. economist at NatWest Markets. "By the end of July, we believe the Fed will have seen enough to decide that action to counter downside economic risks and low inflation/inflation expectations is warranted, and so we look for a 25 basis point rate cut at the next FOMC meeting."
Markets are running well ahead of that. Futures are fully priced for a quarter-point easing and imply around a 40%chance of a half-point move.
A total 100 basis points of cuts are implied by mid-2020, a major reason two-year yields are well under cash at 1.715%.
GOLD SOARS
Yields on 10-year Treasuries have dived 120 basis points since November and, at 1.99%, are almost back to where they were before Trump was elected in late 2016.
The speed and scale of the latest decline has seen the dollar fall for four sessions in a row against a basket of other currencies to stand at a three-month low of 95.910.