China PMI underwhelms, markets resilient

Asian markets suffered a brief wobble on Thursday as data on China's vast manufacturing sector just missed forecasts, with holidays across much of the region muffling the impact. The conflicted mood was clear in the Australian dollar, often a bellwether for market thinking on China given the country is a major exporter of resources to the Asian giant. Japan's Nikkei (NIK:^9452) was up 0.4 percent, while Australian shares (.AXJO) eased 0.4 percent. That was a resilient performance given government data had shown the U.S. economy grew just 0.1 percent annualized in the first quarter, far below already gloomy forecasts of 1.2 percent.

by via Yahoo! Finance: Top Stories