Asian Equities Poised for Best February on Record: Markets Wrap

(Bloomberg) — Asian stocks were on track for their best February on record as investors piled into the region’s companies supplying the artificial intelligence infrastructure build-out.

The MSCI Asia Pacific Index has gained 6.7% this month, making it the best February performance since the inception of the index in 1998. The gauge — up 0.1% on Friday — is also poised to outperform the S&P 500 Index for a third consecutive month. Equity-index futures indicated Wall Street benchmarks were set to slip on Friday.

South Korea — a bellwether for AI investments — was the standout performer in Asia, with the Kospi Index gaining about 20% this month. It’s the world’s best-performing gauge this year after a 49% surge year-to-date.

“Asian stocks have very much stolen the spotlight in 2026, particularly in contrast to the marginal gains by US benchmarks,” said Tim Waterer, a market analyst at KCM Trade. “We are seeing global capital continue to rotate toward the region’s tech stocks.”

Asian equities have outpaced European and US benchmarks as investors flocked to companies underpinning the expansion of AI infrastructure, viewing the region’s firms as the “picks and shovels” of the supply chain. By contrast, the disruptive potential of the new technology has roiled stocks across sectors for weeks in the US, in what’s become known as the “AI scare trade.”

Global asset managers who collectively oversee more than $20 trillion of assets have grown more bullish across emerging-market equities, currencies, domestic bonds and credit, potentially offering fresh momentum to the sector’s record-busting rally.

Citigroup Inc., which reviewed the published outlooks of some of the world’s biggest asset managers, found that funds had added to long positions in markets across Asia, Latin America, as well as Europe, the Middle East and Africa. The findings came as MSCI’s main emerging equity index also traded close to record highs.

In other corners of the market, Treasuries held their gains with the yield on the 10-year holding at 4%. At one point during the US session, the yield touched its lowest this year. The dollar was little changed.

In commodities, oil steadied after the US and Iran agreed to more nuclear talks next week following a round of discussions on Thursday, as a huge deployment of American forces in the Middle East kept the market on edge. Also, gold was poised to close out its longest run of monthly gains since 1973, with February’s 6%-plus climb set to be the seventh on the trot.

Technology shares were the biggest decliners in Asia on Friday. That came after a drop in Wall Street benchmarks, as sentiment was weighed down by a muted reaction to Nvidia Corp.’s earnings.

The sober response to Nvidia, which included beats on revenue, net income and guidance, was partly because investors now expect such outperformance, according to Hardika Singh at Fundstrat Global Advisors.

“But where it did miss was easing investors’ concerns about its narrowing moat in the evolving world of compute and explaining its gameplan for how it’ll fare in a world of AI disruption that could upend all kinds of businesses from cybersecurity to food delivery to banks,” she said.

Corporate Highlights:

Netflix Inc. dropped out of the fight to buy Warner Bros. Discovery Inc., clearing the way for rival bidder Paramount Skydance Corp. to clinch its $111 billion deal for the historic Hollywood studio. Jack Dorsey’s Block is cutting 4,000 employees, reducing its workforce by nearly half, in a move the financial technology firm is describing as a bet on artificial intelligence changing the future of labor productivity. Dell Technologies Inc. shares jumped in extended trading after the company gave an outlook for sales of its artificial intelligence servers that exceeded estimates Coupang Inc. reported a surprise loss in the fourth quarter, underscoring the strain facing the company following a massive data breach in South Korea, its main market. Some of the main moves in markets:

Stocks

S&P 500 futures fell 0.3% as of 11:59 a.m. Tokyo time Japan’s Topix rose 0.8% Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 was little changed Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 0.5% The Shanghai Composite was little changed Euro Stoxx 50 futures were little changed Currencies

The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index was little changed The euro was little changed at $1.1800 The Japanese yen rose 0.2% to 155.75 per dollar The offshore yuan fell 0.2% to 6.8550 per dollar Cryptocurrencies

Bitcoin fell 0.3% to $67,288.68 Ether fell 0.2% to $2,026.96 Bonds

The yield on 10-year Treasuries was little changed at 4.00% Japan’s 10-year yield declined two basis points to 2.130% Australia’s 10-year yield declined four basis points to 4.66% Commodities

West Texas Intermediate crude fell 0.3% to $65.04 a barrel Spot gold was little changed This story was produced with the assistance of Bloomberg Automation.

–With assistance from Winnie Hsu and Shikhar Balwani.

©2026 Bloomberg L.P.