(MENAFN- AFP) Asian markets mostly rose on Tuesday following a record close on Wall Street but concerns about Greece's long-running debt reform talks dragged the euro after a recent rally.
Another weak US indicator further narrowed expectations the Federal Reserve will raise US interest rates soon, with analysts now tipping the bank to wait until the final quarter of the year.
Tokyo ticked up 0.63 percent, Shanghai added 0.86 percent and Seoul put on 0.22 percent, while Hong Kong was down 0.15 percent and Sydney was flat.
US investors pushed the Dow and S&P 500 to new records on Monday, thanks to a rally in Apple and multi-billion-dollar acquisitions in the pharma and apparel sectors.
The Dow rose 0.14 percent and the S&P 500 added 0.30 percent, while the Nasdaq jumped 0.60 percent.
The gains have also been helped by the lower expectations of a rate hike in the near future.
Disappointing data on homebuilders' confidence was the latest to indicate weakness in the world's top economy, following last week's soft retail sales, consumer sentiment and industrial production figures.
"Patchy US data means that the Fed is highly unlikely to begin its policy normalisation process until late in the December quarter," Matthew Sherwood, Sydney-based head of investment strategy at Perpetual Ltd., told Bloomberg News.
"There has been a large upward movement in the dollar in the past 10 months and this has clearly weighed on US growth. The Fed could not possibly be convinced that the economy is on the right track until growth is above three percent for two consecutive quarters."
The dollar continues to hold up, even though the chances of a rate hike have slimmed.
On Tuesday morning in Asia it was at 119.95 yen early Tuesday, compared with 119.97 yen in New York but up from 119.63 yen in Tokyo earlier Monday.
The euro bought $1.1307 and 135.57 yen against $1.1315 and 135.75 yen in US trade.
The single currency's losses come after a recent rally against the dollar and yen despite Greece's ongoing woes and the European Central Bank's bond-buying programme that essentially prints money.
Talks between Athens and its creditors have so far been unable to reach an agreement to overhaul the troubled country's bailout in a way that would release billions of euros to help it service its debts.
There are fears that if it defaults on those loans Greece could tumble out of the eurozone.
Late Monday Greece's To Vima daily reported a European Commission proposal to break the deadlock by next month giving it a combined 3.7 billion euros in bailout cash in return for fiscal reforms worth 5.0 billion euros.
However, Athens nor the European Commission could not confirm that.
On oil markets US benchmark West Texas Intermediate for June delivery gained 16 cents to $59.59 while Brent crude for July rose one cent to $66.28.
Gold fetched $1,224.48 from $1,230.00 late Monday.
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