Meanwhile, Samsung Group’s chief Jay Y. Lee will go on trial for bribery and embezzlement, amid a corruption scandal that has led to the impeachment of President Park Geun-hye.
Traders in the region will also watch for more geopolitical-related news out of east Asia, after Washington’s ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said Wednesday that the U.N. was re-evaluating how it must deal with North Korea after it’s repeated missile tests and that “all options are on the table.”
Over in the U.S., major indexes closed mostly lower amid plunging oil prices and data which showed private sector employment added 298,000 jobs last month, according to ADP and Moody’s, well above a Reuters poll estimate of 190,000.
The Dow Jones industrial average was down 0.33 percent, or 69.03 points at 20,855.73, the S&P 500 dropped 0.23 percent or 5.41 points to close at 2,362.98 and the Nasdaq composite rose just 0.06 percent or 3.62 points to end at 5,837.55.
China is expected to release it consumer price index (CPI) and producer price index (PPI) later in the morning.
On Wednesday, China unexpected posted its first trade deficit in three years last month, as a construction boom pushed imports up 38.1 percent in dollar-denominated terms as exports fell 1.3 percent.
The upbeat data reinforced that China’s economic activity picked up in the first two months in 2017 and contributed to a global manufacturing revival, Reuters reported.
The dollar index was trading at 102.12 in early Asian time, above the levels around 101 for the past four sessions. The stronger dollar led the yen to weaken to 114.43 and the Australian dollar slipped to $0.7525.
