Small Caps Lead China’s Market

China’s slight recovery Thursday hasn’t done much to alleviate Asian investors’ worries. Asian Stocks came in with a mixed performance for the day with small-caps on the mainland attracting the strongest buying interest.

Prices dropped slightly as the day worn on as a slow uptake on Wall Street and weakness in commodity prices kept traders wary. Investors are also holding back ahead of the European Central Bank’s policy meeting later in the day.

China’s key Shanghai Composite index was flat following a day which saw a 3.5 percent drop to a near one-week low on Wednesday. The CSI300 Index also nudged up 0.2 percent. Investors turned to small caps sending the Shenzhen Composite up 1.4 percent while the start-up ChiNext board moved up 2.2 percent.

Wall Street Lower

On Wall Street, major U.S. averages finished lower overnight, with insurance and healthcare companies pulling prices down. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (QQQ) lost 0.8 percent, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DIA) and S&P 500 (SPY) closed down 0.3 and 0.6 percent respectively.

Global oil prices skidded more than 2 percent to three-week lows on Wednesday, continuing a three-session losing streak, on worries over increasing U.S. crude stockpiles and copper fell to a two-week low.

Hikaru Sato, a senior technical analyst at Daiwa Securities said “Global investors are taking a wait-and-see stance before the ECB event, as depending on the outcome the euro could move sharply.”