Asian stocks rose this month, with the benchmark index heading for its biggest gain in three years, as the US Federal Reserve unexpectedly maintained stimulus and data signaled that China’s economy is strengthening.
Tencent Holdings Ltd (騰訊), Asia’s biggest Internet company, gained 11 percent in Hong Kong this month to touch a record high, while Tokyo Electron Ltd surged 31 percent after Applied Materials Inc announced a plan to take over the Tokyo-based company. Acom Co soared 49 percent, spurring the consumer lender to the biggest gain on the Asian equities index, after a report said that Japan’s non-bank loans to individuals are picking up.
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index rose 7.5 percent this month through Friday, the most since September 2010, and added 0.1 percent this week.
The US Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) said on Sept. 18 that it wants more evidence that improvement in the US economy will be sustained before slowing the pace of its US$85 billion in monthly asset purchases.
“After the FOMC meeting, investors saw that the Fed was more dovish than they expected, so the rebound was huge,” Grace Tam, a Hong Kong-based global market strategist at JPMorgan Asset Management, said in a telephone interview. “People were too bearish on China and are now starting to feel some relief. If China is doing good, it helps the rest of Asia.”
Profits at China’s industrial companies rose 24 percent last month, data showed on Friday. A preliminary reading of HSBC Holdings PLC and Markit Economics’ Purchasing Managers’ Index for China released on Monday rose to 51.2, a six-month high.
In Taipei, the TAIEX rose 0.56 percent, or 46 points, to end at 8,230.68 on Friday, compared with 8,209.18 on Sept. 18, the last day of trading that week before markets shut for the Mid-Autumn Festival.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電) rose 1.48 percent to NT$103 on Friday, while Hon Hai Precision Industry Co Ltd (鴻海集團) was 0.66 percent higher at NT$76.3.
Japan’s TOPIX fell 0.1 percent this week, but gained 10 percent last month, rising for the first month in five, as Tokyo won a bid to host the 2020 Olympic Games.
In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 Index gained 3.4 percent this month and climbed 0.6 percent since Sept. 20 through Friday, while New Zealand’s NZX 50 Index advanced 5.3 percent for the month.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index jumped 6.8 percent this month, China’s Shanghai Composite Index gained 2.9 percent and Singapore’s Straits Times Index rose 6 percent.
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index touched a four-month high on Monday after the Fed announcement and has jumped 7.6 percent this quarter.
A pickup in China’s growth may boost Chinese Premier Li Keqiang’s (李克強) odds of meeting Beijing’s 7.5 percent expansion goal this year. Goldman Sachs Group Inc, Credit Suisse Group AG, Deutsche Bank AG and JPMorgan Chase & Co have all raised economic growth projections for the world’s second-biggest economy.
Analysts had predicted a US$5 billion reduction in Fed stimulus this month, estimates compiled by Bloomberg show.
Tapering could begin later this year should the data confirm the US central bank’s “basic outlook,” Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke said.
In other markets on Friday:
Wellington added 0.36 percent, or 17.21 points, from Thursday to close at 4,782.68.
Manila fell 0.43 percent, or 27.65 points, ending on 6,379.81.
Mumbai dropped by 0.84 percent, or 166.58 points, to 19,727.27.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day