Dhaka, Sept. 24 -- Asian stocks mostly slipped on Wednesday after Wall Street's record-breaking run took a breather, with U.S. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell cautioning that stock prices are "fairly highly valued."

Japan's Nikkei 225 fell 0.4% to 45,300.30 in morning trade, while Australia's S&P/ASX 200 dropped 1.0% to 8,756.30 and South Korea's Kospi slid 1.1% to 3,448.44. In contrast, Hong Kong's Hang Seng gained 0.6% to 26,305.02, and the Shanghai Composite edged up 0.2% to 3,829.91.

On Wall Street, the S&P 500 lost 0.6%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average shed 88 points, or 0.2%, and the Nasdaq composite sank 0.9%. The decline ended a three-day streak of record highs for all three indexes.

Markets have surged since April, but so...