Asia markets mostly fall as investors assess business activity data from the region, Fed minutes

Asia-Pacific markets mostly fell Thursday, with investors digesting flash business activity data from Australia and Japan while awaiting numbers from India.

The Bank of Korea has also held its benchmark interest rate at 3.5%, in line with expectations. The BOK noted in its release that inflation in South Korea has continued its downward trend, although it did point out that there was a need to monitor real estate prices and household debt.

This comes after the Federal Reserve released minutes for its July meeting, where the summary revealed that some participants made the case to ease rates at the July meeting instead of September.

However, “the vast majority” of participants at the July 30-31 meeting “observed that, if the data continued to come in about as expected, it would likely be appropriate to ease policy at the next meeting,” the summary said.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 was 0.24% higher, while the broad based Topix was down 0.15%. Japan’s business activity expanded at a faster pace in August, with the composite purchasing managers index climbing to 53.0 from July’s 52.5.

The country’s manufacturing sector swung back to growth, while its services sector saw a faster expansion.

South Korea’s Kospi reversed earlier gains to fall 0.34%, while the small-cap Kosdaq saw a larger loss of 1.39%.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index rose 0.35%, while mainland China’s CSI 300 lost 0.24%.

Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 rose 0.25%, after the country’s flash composite purchasing managers’ index in August climbed to 51.4 from 49.9 the month before, reaching a three-month high and underpinned by rising services activity, Judo Bank said.

In the U.S., all three major benchmarks gained after the Fed minutes reinforced hope for lower rates in the near future.

The S&P 500 added 0.42%, bringing the benchmark within 1% of its all-time record close. The tech heavy Nasdaq Composite climbed 0.57%, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average ticked up by 0.14%.

—CNBC’s Alex Harring and Samantha Subin contributed to this report.