Asia-Pacific stocks trade mixed as Trump lands in Beijing for high-stakes Xi meeting

Asia-Pacific markets traded mixed Thursday as investors look to a high-stakes meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping for clues on the future of U.S.-China ties and global trade.

Trump landed in Beijing Wednesday for the closely watched summit, accompanied by a group of U.S. executives, including Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Nvidia boss Jensen Huang.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 rose 0.27%, while the Topix slid 0.23%. South Korea’s Kospi added 0.38%, while the small-cap Kosdaq climbed 1.31%.

Samsung shares rose as much as 5.46%, notching a fresh record high. The tech giant suffered a brief wirepout of $66 billion in market value on Wednesday following a labor dispute that threatened one of the biggest strikes in the company’s history.

This comes as the labor union threatened an 18-day strike from May 21 if its demands were not met. More than 41,000 workers are expected to join the walkout, which was first announced at a rally on April 23.

South Korea’s finance minister Koo Yun-cheol warned Thursday that a potential strike by Samsung workers could pose a major threat to the country’s economic growth, exports and financial markets.

In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 0.16%.

Hong Kong Hang Seng index rose 1.32%, while the CSI 300 added 0.27%.

Analysts at Goldman Sachs said they expect the Trump-Xi meeting to focus narrowly on trade and export controls, including tariffs, restrictions on rare earths and semiconductors, rather than producing a sweeping reset in bilateral ties.

The investment bank said China could agree to step up purchases of U.S. farm goods, energy and aircraft in exchange for avoiding further tariff hikes.

“While unlikely to be a game changer for US-China relations, we think the meeting could act as a tactical catalyst for strength in the Chinese yuan and Chinese equities,” Goldman’s analysts wrote in a note late Wednesday.

The bank maintained a positive view on China assets, citing the country’s export competitiveness and what it described as an “undervalued” currency, while reiterating an overweight call on Chinese equities, particularly mainland A-shares over Hong Kong-listed H-shares.

In the U.S., futures were little changed. S&P futures and Nasdaq 100 futures climbed 0.1% and 0.4%, respectively. Futures tied to the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose by 111 points, or nearly 0.3%.

Overnight on Wall Street, the S&P 500 rose to a new all-time high as traders’ enthusiasm for the technology trade overshadowed yet another hotter-than-expected inflation report.

The broad market index rose 0.58% to 7,444.25, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq added 1.2% to end at 26,402.34. Both hit fresh intraday and closing records. The Dow Jones Industrial Average shed 67.36 points, or 0.14%, ending at 49,693.20.

— CNBC’s Lim Hui Jie, Lisa Kailai Han and Sean Conlon contributed to this report.