China A-share culture and media sector spiked briefly; iReader Technology hit the daily limit, Desheng Technology was earlier locked at the limit, and Jiecheng, Mango Excellent Media, Ciwen Media, Xinhua Media and Visual China also advanced.

Indonesian equities extended losses after MSCI announced last week it was considering a standalone market classification; the Jakarta Composite Index fell 4.7% to 4,941.63.

On the evening of the 18th (local time), incumbent President and Workers' Party candidate Lula and Flavio Bolsonaro, son of former president Jair Bolsonaro and the Liberal Party candidate, met in their first head-to-head televised debate of the campaign. First-round voting on the 4th of this month returned Flavio with about 47% of valid votes, roughly two percentage points ahead of Lula. The pair advance to a runoff on the 25th.