[MARKET ANALYSIS] Asia-Pac stocks are mixed as the region attempts to shrug off last Friday's tech rout and amid cautiousness ahead of the midterms

APAC Stocks: Mixed Asia-Pac stocks are ultimately mixed as the region partially shrugs off last Friday's continued tech rout on Wall St, where the Nasdaq briefly dipped into correction territory following weak key earnings, while participants are also cautious ahead of the US midterm elections on Tuesday and second-guess whether US President Trump will resume strikes on Iran post-election, although there are some hopes for diplomacy after Iran held talks with Qatari mediators in Doha. ASX 200: -0.6% Index is dragged lower by underperformance in miners, materials, resources and financials heading into a widely expected rate hike by the RBA tomorrow and with Westpac indecisive following its earnings results. Nikkei 225: -0.3% Price action is choppy but with the index off its worst levels after reclaiming the 63,000 level. KOSPI +1.5% Clawed back the initial tech-related losses to outperform its regional peers, with South Korean President Lee pledging that the government will nearly double AI investment spending next year to KRW 21.3tln, while he also commented that the Future Response Fund will be a strategic investment platform, as well as a fiscal stability mechanism. Hang Seng & Shanghai Comp: Hang Seng +0.1% / Shanghai Comp +0.5% Chinese markets are kept afloat following a recent slew of earnings, including from China's big four banks, which all posted profit growth and with the PBoC meeting with Chinese regulators and major banks to discuss measures to support the capital market. In addition, the central bank announced changes to its 7-day reverse repo operations and shifted to overnight reverse repos as its main policy anchor, while participants also digest the latest PMI data, which were mixed as the official releases missed expectations and fell into contraction territory, but the Chinese RatingDog Manufacturing PMI continued to show an expansion. US Equity Futures: Positive Rebounded from last Friday's selling pressure, but with the upside capped as participants await looming key events including Apple's earnings after-hours and tomorrow's midterm elections. European Equity Futures +0.3% Indicate a mildly positive cash market open with Euro Stoxx 50 futures up 0.3% after the cash market closed with losses of 1.2% on Friday.