Asian stocks slide ahead of potentially turbulent week

Amazon.com to Credit Suisse results and Fed rate decision due this week

Traders at work at South Korea’s stock exchange. Equities there and across Asia fell. Yonhap / EPA

Stocks in Asia dropped and the yen rose for a fifth day as traders showed caution ahead of a week packed with earnings results and a Federal Reserve interest-rate decision.

Equities gauges were lower in Japan, Australia and South Korea, while benchmarks in Hong Kong and China advanced. The Australian dollar remained above 79 US cents ahead of a speech by Reserve Bank of Australia governor Philip Lowe on Wednesday.

The market is bidding down the dollar as risk aversion increases ahead of the senior presidential adviser Jared Kushner appearing before the senate intelligence committee on Monday, and Donald Trump Jr and former the Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort going before senate committees investigating Russian meddling on Wednesday.

Earnings from industry bellwethers from Amazon.com to GlaxoSmithKline and Credit Suisse Group are due this week, and central bank policy discussions are providing the latest tests for the bull market in equities that’s propelled the value of global shares to US$78 trillion. The Fed is expected to stand pat, with investors looking to the accompanying statement for clues on how officials plan to start reducing the balance sheet.