Asian shares slip from two-year top as economic strains pile up

Asian stocks eased from a two-year high on Wednesday, as a mixed bag of economic data had investors a touch more circumspect about the global recovery, while oil jumped to a five-month peak owing to a hurricane disrupting output in the Gulf of Mexico. MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan edged down 0.1% after hitting its highest since mid-2018 on Tuesday. Japan's Nikkei was off 0.1%.