Asian shares are mostly higher after a mixed finish on Wall Street, where shares in Nvidia, Palantir and other superstar stocks pared their earlier steep losses

Dow futures slipped slightly on Wednesday as investors adopted a cautious stance ahead of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell’s upcoming remarks at the Jackson Hole Symposium.

The tech sector was behind much of the market recovery from the April selloff, but investors have started to take stock of the elevated valuations, sending the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq to their worst day in more than two weeks on Tuesday.

The week’s biggest news for Wall Street is likely arriving on Friday, when Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell will give a highly anticipated speech in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. The setting has been home to big policy announcements from the Fed in the past, and the hope on Wall Street is that Powell will hint that an interest rate cut is coming soon.

Shares on Wall Street dropped for a second successive day on Wednesday as weakness in the tech sector persisted while a key meeting of central bankers later this week remained in focus for currency and rates traders.

A dealer watches his computer monitors near screens showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), left, the foreign exchange rate between US dollar and South Korean won and the Korean Securities Dealers Automated Quotations (KOSDAQ) at a dealing room of Hana Bank in Seoul, South Korea on Aug 20. (AP)