Asian stock markets are trading mostly lower on Wednesday, following the broadly negative cues from Wall Street overnight, as surging crude oil prices led to a sustained acceleration in the pace of inflation and continued to drive global bond yields higher, increasing the possibility of an interest rate hike in the coming months to combat inflation. Asian markets closed mixed on Tuesday.
CME Group's FedWatch Tool is currently indicating a 41.9 percent chance rates will be a quarter point higher following the US Fed's last monetary policy meeting of the year.
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May 15, 2026 15:25 ET Apart from the confirmation of Kevin Warsh as the next Fed chair, the main news on the economics front this week included key price data from the U.S. and the first quarter economic growth figures from major economies. Both consumer prices and producer costs have started to reflect the effect of supply shocks due to the Middle East conflict. In Europe, GDP data was in focus, while inflation data from China dominated the news flow in Asia.