On Tuesday, Asia-Pacific stock markets saw a downward trend, lacking significant catalysts, despite two major Wall Street indexes enjoying gains overnight due to optimism in the tech sector.

Amazon’s stock surged by 4% following a substantial $38 billion agreement with OpenAI, which involves utilizing a vast number of Nvidia’s graphics processing units. Nvidia shares also experienced a rise, gaining around 2%, after the company obtained export licenses to deliver its chips to the United Arab Emirates.

The S&P/ASX 200 in Australia declined by 0.91% to settle at 8,813.7. This drop followed the Reserve Bank of Australia’s decision to keep the cash rate steady at 3.6%, driven by worries over rising inflation.

In Japan, the Nikkei 225 witnessed a decline of 1.74%, closing at 51,497.2, while the Topix index slipped by 0.65% to end at 3,310.14. Meanwhile, South Korea’s Kospi index saw a decrease of 2.37%, closing at 4,121.74, even as the Kosdaq, focusing on small-cap stocks, rose by 1.31% to 926.57.

The Kospi has gained in 12 of the past 15 sessions, hitting multiple fresh highs this month on the back of global AI tailwinds as well as local structural changes that are steadily eroding the long-standing “Korea discount.”

On Tuesday, South Korea also announced that it would triple AI spending in 2026, with President Lee Jae Myung reportedly saying that 10.1 trillion won ($7 billion) was earmarked for AI transformation, according to South Korean media outlet Yonhap.

The budget, which is triple the 3.3 trillion won allocated for AI this year, will help South Korea become one of the world’s top three AI powers, Lee said.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index lost 0.79% to 25,952.4 while mainland’s CSI 300 declined 0.75% to 4,618.70.

Overnight in the U.S., the tech-heavy Nasdaq advanced 0.46%, while the S&P 500 traded up 0.17%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lagged, falling 0.48%.

— CNBC’s Sean Conlon and Fred Imbert contributed to this report.