Asian stock markets fall

Asian stocks fall as Covid protests lead Hong Kong stocks led losses in a negative Asia-Pacific session on Monday amid unrest in China over its ongoing zero-Covid policy. Oil futures are trading near new lows for 2022 as concerns about demand from the world’s second-largest oil consumer weigh on prices. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index fell 4% at the open and was last trading 2.26% lower. The Shanghai Composite was down 1.16% and the Shenzhen Composite was down 1.3%. The offshore yuan weakened sharply against the dollar after closing last week around 7.20 per dollar. U.S. crude futures fell more than $2 to their lowest levels since December 2021. China’s central bank said over the weekend it would cut the reserve requirement ratio for banks by 25 basis points to 7.8% and inject about 500 billion yuan into long-term liquidity. The National Bureau of Statistics said industrial profits fell 3 percent on an annual basis in the first 10 months of the year. In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.36 percent in October as retail sales fell 0.2 percent from the previous month. The Nikkei 225 lost 0.62 percent and the Topix lost 0.79 percent. The Kospi in South Korea fell 0.95 percent.