Developing world assets trimmed early losses on Wednesday after a report suggesting some progress in Sino-U.S. trade talks helped offset concerns over further delays to progress in curtailing their trade war.
Global equities recovered some losses after Bloomberg reported that the United States and China were moving closer to agreeing on the amount of tariffs to be rolled back in a phase-one deal.
MSCI's emerging market stocks index traded about 0.2% lower, having dropped as much as 0.6% to its weakest level since late October earlier in the day.
A basket of developing world currencies recouped the day's losses to trade flat, with China's yuan bouncing back from a one-month low to strengthen slightly against the dollar in onshore trade.
Markets dropped after U.S. President Donald Trump said on Tuesday a trade deal with China might have to wait until after the 2020 U.S. presidential election.
Chinese stocks, which are heavy weights on the MSCI benchmark, had ended lower for the day before the release of the Bloomberg report.
Hong Kong stocks closed near a two-month low after data showed the economic zone's business activity in November shrank at its fastest pace in 21 years.
U.S. services sector data for November, expected later on Wednesday, could further weaken the dollar following soft manufacturing data this week. Recent dollar weakness has somewhat alleviated pressure on emerging market currencies.
The Indian rupee ticked up slightly following the Bloomberg report, while a private survey showed better-than-expected services sector growth in November.
South Africa's rand recouped some of Tuesday's losses, which followed weak GDP data. Fresh data on Wednesday showed manufacturing activity in the country contracted in November from a month earlier.
(Reporting by Ambar Warrick and Aaron Saldanha in Bengaluru Editing by Alexandra Hudson and Timothy Heritage) ((Ambar.Warrick@thomsonreuters.com; +91-80-6749-6625; Reuters Messaging: ambar.warrick.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net; Twitter: @AmbarWarrick))
