Thailand's baht fell toward a three- week low and government bonds advanced before a report that economists predict will show exports dropped for a fourth month.
Overseas sales decreased 2.7% in September from a year earlier after a 7% slide in August, according to the median forecast in a Bloomberg survey before data due 11am in Bangkok. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index of shares declined for a fourth day as earnings that trailed estimates at companies including DuPont Co and Kawasaki Heavy Industries Ltd fanned concern the international economy is worsening.
"We are seeing weaker earnings, which makes investors worry about the global economic slowdown and hurts market sentiment," said Tsutomu Soma, manager of the investment trust and fixed-income business unit at Rakuten Securities Inc in Tokyo. "This is feeding into the deterioration in the export outlook for Asia and weighing on regional currencies."
The baht declined 0.1% from Oct 22 to 30.77 per US dollar as of 8.24am in Bangkok and touched 30.79 earlier, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. That was near the three-week low of 30.80 reached on Oct 22. Onshore markets were shut on Tuesday for a public holiday. One-month implied volatility, a measure of exchange-rate swings used to price options, held at 4.27%.
DuPont, the most valuable US chemical maker, posted a smaller profit than analysts estimated, while Japan's Kawasaki Heavy missed its profit forecast by almost half. Of the 61 companies on Asia's benchmark equity index that have reported quarterly earnings since Oct 1, more than half missed analyst profit projections, while almost two-thirds lagged sales estimates, according to data compiled by Bloomberg News.
The yield on the 3.25% bonds due June 2017 slipped two basis points, or 0.02 percentage point, to 3.10%, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.