Asian stocks on Friday closed mostly higher, but gains were limited with regional benchmarks struggling to break through current resistance levels despite another record finish by Wall Street.
In most markets the trading band was narrow and followed a pattern set earlier in the week after equities struck a series of record and multi-year highs amid a rush of capital from outside the region.
Tumbling oil prices and tame US inflation data, additional evidence that the US Federal Reserve might cut interest rates, only sparked limited Asian interest with investors tending to focus on issues closer to home.
This was particularly the case in Japan, where lingering concerns over the local economic outlook resulted in Tokyo falling 0.45 percent while profit takers moved into Mumbai, where the benchmark fell 0.57 percent.
Slight gains were registered in Hong Kong and a modest rise in Singapore, enough for both markets to again close at record highs. Manila and Kuala Lumpur notched up their best closing levels in nine years.
Taipei, Seoul, Bangkok and Wellington ended the day little change, while Jakarta was up 0.20 percent, Kuala Lumpur by 0.31 percent and Sydney by 0.50 percent while Shanghai was the standout with a 1.55 percent gain.
TAIPEI
Share prices closed little changed in active trading, after moving largely sideways, as investors refrain from pushing share prices higher on the back of Wall Street's gains overnight and a further pull-back in oil prices.
The TAIEX closed 2.06 points higher at 7,259.54 on turnover of NT$105.36 billion (US$3.2 billion).
"As had been apparent over the past three sessions, investors would rather pocket the differences while they still could," said Oliver Fang, a Yuanta Core Pacific Securities (
Against the backdrop of a generally bullish Wall Street, local shares managed to post moderate gains but could not convince investors to help attain a more dramatic upswing, he said.
As things stand, further rangebound consolidation appears likely in the near term as Wall Street is also unlikely to continue setting new highs persistently, he added.
TOKYO
Share prices fell 0.45 percent, hovering just above the key 16,000-point mark, on lingering concerns about the outlook for the economy.
Dealers said that the Japanese market erased early gains that were triggered by Wall Street's latest record performance as dealers opted to book profits for the third straight session.
While the Bank of Japan said on Thursday that the economy is expanding, some dealers asked if the central bank's reluctance to raise interest rates indicated it had doubts.
The NIKKEI-225 fell 72.14 points to finish at 16,091.73. Volume rose to 1.71 billion shares from 1.53 billion on Thursday.
Hideyuki Suzuki, a strategist at SBI Securities, said the market's recent bearish performance reflected a cooling of investor sentiment.
"Domestic demand is not that strong, meaning that companies that have subsidiaries overseas can fare well, but those that don't will suffer," he said.
"Overseas investors may have turned their gaze back to their home markets because their markets have been on a bull run," he added.
Hideo Mizutani, chief strategist at Sieg Securities, said that Japanese share prices failed to maintain a rally buoyed by another record-breaking performance on Wall Street.
"Japan's share prices showed a knee-jerk reaction to gains on US stocks market but the market here soon lost momentum amid lingering worries about the Japanese economy," Mizutani said.
SEOUL
Shares closed slightly higher as foreign investors unloaded IT stocks to take profits, with Wall Street's continued gains providing support.
The KOSPI index closed up 1.47 points at 1,412.22.
HONG KONG
Share prices closed slightly higher, sending the index deeper into record territory, as local banking stocks and China commodity counters drew strong interest.
Dealers said major local banks rose on expectations that increasing activity in the mortgage lending market will help boost their revenue and this was enough to push the benchmark further into record territory.
Select China commodity counters drew buying interest on expectations of windfall gains in this sector in the event of an appreciation of the yuan.
The Hang Seng Index closed up 28.64 points or 0.15 percent at 19,182.71.
SHANGHAI
Share prices closed sharply higher, adding 1.55 percent on strong follow-through buying with blue chips and airlines snapped up in particular.
The Shanghai A-share Index jumped 31.67 points to 2,072.75 on turnover and the Shenzhen A-share Index was up 7.35 points or 1.59 percent at 469.0. The Shanghai Composite Index, which covers A and B shares, closed up 30.25 points or 1.56 percent at 1,971.79. Turnover was 27.54 billion yuan.
"Strong follow-through buying in heavyweight blue chips boosted the key index to a new high, and market sentiment remains upbeat after recent consecutive sessions of gains," said Shen Jun, an analyst at Guosen Securities.
SYDNEY
Share prices closed 0.50 percent higher fuelled by a record high on Wall Street, while lower overnight metal prices sparked selling in the local resources.
Dealers said they foresaw further problems for the resources sector, which had led the market's recent pull-back, if technology stocks continued their global rise.
The SP/ASX 200 rose 27.1 points to 5,419.7. Turnover was 1.36 billion shares.
SINGAPORE
Share prices broke through the key 2,800 point level to close at a record high for a fourth straight day amid buying in select blue chips and tech stocks.
Dealers said the market was also aided by a fresh Wall Street peak struck after the release of tame US inflation data indicating the United States Federal Reserve may move to cut interest rates sooner rather than later.
The Straits Times Index closed 14.73 points higher at 2,813.18.
KUALA LUMPUR
Share prices closed slightly higher as profit-taking limited blue chip gains such as in gaming group Genting and Resorts.
The composite index gained 3.19 points at 1,040.79.
BANGKOK
Share prices closed 0.11 percent higher amid falling oil prices, as small-cap domestic-oriented stocks boosted the volume.
The composite index gained 0.78 points to 733.92 with 122 stocks unchanged.
JAKARTA
Share prices closed up 0.20 percent as banks gained after the government divested its remaining stake in PT Bank Internasional Indonesia (BII).
The composite index closed up 3.284 points at 1,672.108.
MUMBAI
Share prices fell 0.57 percent, snapping six straight days of gain as investors locked-in profits.
Dealers said the markets quickly shed early morning gains and slid from a fresh all-time peak on Friday of 13,678.04 for the SENSEX, as banking, automobile and software stocks fell.
The 30-share SENSEX index fell 76.41 points or 0.57 percent to 13,429.48, after having risen nearly 3.5 percent in the past week and by almost 43 percent since the start of the year as foreign funds pumped in US$7.86 billion into Indian equities.
MULTIFACETED: A task force has analyzed possible scenarios and created responses to assist domestic industries in dealing with US tariffs, the economics minister said The Executive Yuan is tomorrow to announce countermeasures to US President Donald Trump’s planned reciprocal tariffs, although the details of the plan would not be made public until Monday next week, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. The Cabinet established an economic and trade task force in November last year to deal with US trade and tariff related issues, Kuo told reporters outside the legislature in Taipei. The task force has been analyzing and evaluating all kinds of scenarios to identify suitable responses and determine how best to assist domestic industries in managing the effects of Trump’s tariffs, he
In a small town in Paraguay, a showdown is brewing between traditional producers of yerba mate, a bitter herbal tea popular across South America, and miners of a shinier treasure: gold. A rush for the precious metal is pitting mate growers and indigenous groups against the expanding operations of small-scale miners who, until recently, were their neighbors, not nemeses. “They [the miners] have destroyed everything... The canals, springs, swamps,” said Vidal Britez, president of the Yerba Mate Producers’ Association of the town of Paso Yobai, about 210km east of capital Asuncion. “You can see the pollution from the dead fish.
TIGHT-LIPPED: UMC said it had no merger plans at the moment, after Nikkei Asia reported that the firm and GlobalFoundries were considering restarting merger talks United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電), the world’s No. 4 contract chipmaker, yesterday launched a new US$5 billion 12-inch chip factory in Singapore as part of its latest effort to diversify its manufacturing footprint amid growing geopolitical risks. The new factory, adjacent to UMC’s existing Singapore fab in the Pasir Res Wafer Fab Park, is scheduled to enter volume production next year, utilizing mature 22-nanometer and 28-nanometer process technologies, UMC said in a statement. The company plans to invest US$5 billion during the first phase of the new fab, which would have an installed capacity of 30,000 12-inch wafers per month, it said. The
Taiwan’s official purchasing managers’ index (PMI) last month rose 0.2 percentage points to 54.2, in a second consecutive month of expansion, thanks to front-loading demand intended to avoid potential US tariff hikes, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. While short-term demand appeared robust, uncertainties rose due to US President Donald Trump’s unpredictable trade policy, CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) told a news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s economy this year would be characterized by high-level fluctuations and the volatility would be wilder than most expect, Lien said Demand for electronics, particularly semiconductors, continues to benefit from US technology giants’ effort
RSS