A packed data agenda lies ahead for the Asian session, with China's official PMI figures the priority item.

Setting the stage for the session is renewed geopolitical hostility: U.S. forces have struck two Iranian launchers near the Strait of Hormuz.

China's National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) will release its official August Purchasing Managers' Indices on Monday at 9:30am Beijing time (01:30 GMT / 21:30 US Eastern time Sunday). The manufacturing print will show whether a contraction that deepened sharply in July has begun to ease. As monthly surveys of purchasing executives, the PMIs are among the earliest hard reads on the economy each month, which is why they are closely watched by policymakers and markets alike; a follow-up read on the private sector, the Caixin manufacturing PMI compiled by S&P Global, is typically published a day later and skews toward smaller and export-oriented firms.

A Reuters poll of 17 economists puts the consensus for the official manufacturing PMI at 49.6, up from July's 49.2 but still below the 50-point mark separating expansion from contraction. July's reading missed expectations of 49.9 and marked a 1.1-point drop from June's 50.3, with the weakness extending across firms of all sizes rather than reflecting stress in any single segment of the sector.

The backdrop remains one of soft domestic demand and an ongoing property market slump, which together held second-quarter GDP growth to 4.3%, below the lower end of Beijing's 4.5% to 5% annual target. Offsetting some of that drag has been resilience in manufacturing and exports, with a global boom in AI infrastructure investment lifting demand for China's high-tech goods, even as the broader trade backdrop — including the fallout from the Middle East war — remains uncertain.

A print at or above the 49.6 consensus would support the view that factory activity is stabilising, while a miss would revive concerns that China's slowdown is broadening beyond property into manufacturing more generally.

Alongside the manufacturing figure, the NBS will also publish the non-manufacturing PMI, which covers services and construction and fell to 49.0 in July from 50.2 in June, as well as a composite output index blending both. The non-manufacturing figure will be a gauge of whether consumer and construction activity is following factories into contraction, an important input as Beijing weighs the case for further policy support.