beijing ap asian stock markets were mixed thursday after signs of enduring upward pressure on american prices added to expectations of higher interest rates for longer shanghai and seoul advanced while tokyo and hong kong declined oil prices edged higher don’t miss chinese economic data paint an upbeat picture us companies operating in china are not buying it wall street equities declined wednesday after a survey showed prices paid by us manufacturers rose in february for the first time in five months despite rate increases to cool economic activity and surging inflation that prompted traders to raise expectations of how high the federal reserve might hike rates and push back when cuts might start see minneapolis fed joined st louis and cleveland in pushing for 50basispoint discountrate hike last month also chicago fed’s goolsbee says this is a ‘strange and unprecedented moment’ for us economy “inflation expectations are climbing again” brian levitt of invesco said in a report “the fed pause may not be coming now until the middle of the year at the earliest” elsewhere inflation in germany europe’s biggest economy held steady at 87 over a year earlier in february see uk grocery inflation reaches startling 17 as french and spanish consumer price data surprise on the upside there are “very few to no signs of any disinflationary process outside of energy and commodity prices” despite rate hikes by the european central bank said carsten brzeski of ing in a report the shanghai composite index shcomp gained less than 01 to 331329 while the nikkei 225 in tokyo niy00 shed 02 to 2746932 the hang seng in hong kong hsi gave up 08 to 2045525 the kospi in seoul 180721 rose 08 to 243268 and sydney’s spasx 200 xao was less than 01 higher at 725500 new zealand singapore and bangkok declined jakarta gained on wall street the benchmark sp 500 spx lost 05 to 395139 the dow jones industrial average djia edged up less than 01 to 3266184 the nasdaq comp fell 07 to 1137948 an industry group the institute for supply management reported an index of prices paid by manufacturers rose 513 from january’s 445 on a 100point scale on which numbers above 50 show an increase some traders hoped the fed might ease off rate increases as activity cooled and possibly start to cut by the end of this year but those hopes have been dampened by signs inflation is sticking at high levels and warnings by fed chair jerome powell and other officials that rates will stay elevated for an extended period until price pressures are extinguished the fed has raised its benchmark lending rate to 45 to 475 from close to zero at the start of 2022 in an effort to cool inflation to the traditionally targeted vicinity of 2 after the latest inflation reading traders expect the fed to raise its key rate to at least 525 by june some expect 55 the highest level in 22 years the fed’s latest increase was by a quarter of a percentage point half the more aggressive level of previous increases but one fed board member has publicly suggested going back to halfpoint hikes some retailers have already offered discouraging forecasts due to inflation and other pressure on consumer spending lowe’s low fell 56 for one of the largest losses in the sp 500 after the homeimprovementgoods chain reported weaker revenue for the latest quarter than expected shares of vaccine company novavax nvax tumbled 259 after a warning that there’s now “substantial doubt” about its ability to stay in business over the next year it reported a net loss of 6579 million for the last year in the bond market the yield on the 10year us treasury tmubmusd10y  or the difference between the market price and the payout at maturity rose to 399 from from 393 late tuesday it is near its highest level in three months after exceeding 4 earlier in the day the 2year yield tu00  which moves more on expectations for the fed widened to 489 from 482 in energy markets benchmark us crude cl00 edged up 2 cents to 7771 per barrel in electronic trading on the new york mercantile exchange the contract rose 64 cents on wednesday to 7769 brent crude brn00  the price basis for international oil trading gained 6 cents to 8437 per barrel in london it gained 86 cents the previous session to 8431 a barrel the dollar usdjpy rose to 13623 yen from wednesday’s 13617 yen the euro eurusd edged down to 10657 from 10658