Photo/Illutration A currency trader watches monitors at the foreign exchange dealing room of the KEB Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Nov. 15, 2022. (AP Photo)

BEIJING--Asian stocks gained Tuesday after Wall Street gave back some of last week’s huge gains, the American and Chinese presidents met and China’s consumer spending shrank in a sign its economy is weakening.

Shanghai, Tokyo and Hong Kong, which are the bulk of the region’s market capitalization, advanced. South Korea and Sydney declined. Oil prices retreated.

Wall Street’s benchmark S&P 500 lost 0.9 percent on Monday, giving back part of last week’s 5.9 percent surge after lower U.S. inflation encouraged hopes the Federal Reserve might ease off planned rate hikes to rein in surging prices.

Presidents Joe Biden and Xi Jinping met during a summit of the Group of 20 major economies in Indonesia. That fed hopes for an easing of U.S.-Chinese tension over security, trade, technology and human rights.

Monday’s meeting was “surprisingly positive,” but the “feel-good factor that had been driving markets following the softer-than-expected October CPI release in the U.S. evaporated,” said Robert Carnell and Nicholas Mapa of ING in a report.

The Shanghai Composite Index gained 1.3 percent to 3,123.26 after Chinese consumer spending contracted by 0.5 percent in October over a year ago under pressure from increased anti-virus controls. Growth in factory activity also weakened.

The performance was worse than expected by forecaster who say Chinese economic activity will cool as interest rate hikes by global central banks depress demand for exports.

The Hang Seng in Hong Kong advanced 3.2 percent to 18,179.34 and the Nikkei 225 in Tokyo gained 0.1 percent to 28,002.40.

Seoul’s Kospi sank less than 0.1 percent to 2,472.93 and Sydney’s S&P-ASX 200 shed less than 0.1 percent to 7,141.60.

India’s Sensex opened down 0.2 percent at 61,497.16. New Zealand, Singapore and Bangkok gained while Indonesia was lower.

On Wall Street, the S&P 500 declined to 3,957.25. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 0.6 percent to 33,536.70. The Nasdaq composite fell 1.1 percent to 11,196.22.

Investors worry that this year’s repeated interest rate increases to cool inflation that is near multi-decade highs might tip the global economy into recession.

Traders expected the Fed to raise its benchmark lending rate again at its December but by a smaller margin of one-half percentage point after four hikes of 0.75 percentage points.

Fed officials say rates might have to stay elevated for an extended time to cool prices.

The government is due to report U.S. wholesale inflation on Tuesday. Economists say it likely slowed to 8.3 percent from September’s 8.5 percent.

On Wednesday, the U.S. government gives an update on retail spending. Economists say growth likely revived to 0.9 percent in October from the previous month’s flat performance.

In energy markets, benchmark U.S. crude lost 79 cents to $85.08 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract fell $3.09 to $85.87 on Monday. Brent crude, the price basis for international oil trading, shed 54 cents to $92.60 per barrel in London. It fell $2.85 the previous session to $93.14.

The dollar rose to 140.30 yen from Monday’s 139.92 yen. The euro fell to $1.0332 from $1.0353.

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