Asian markets mostly rose on Thursday and the dollar retreated, brushing off a Wall Street retreat on hopes the Federal Reserve’s latest interest rate hike would be one of its last.
The gains came even as bank chief Jerome Powell dealt a blow to hopes it could cut borrowing costs later in the year to soothe banking sector fears.
Recent turmoil caused by the collapse of two US lenders and the takeover of Credit Suisse had fanned speculation central banks would pause their inflation-fighting monetary tightening campaign.
Powell also told journalists that “rate cuts are not in our base case” and warned that there needed to be more supervision and regulation of banks to prevent another crisis.—AFP
