Asian shares were higher on Friday on hopes for development of a COVID-19 vaccine, although worries remained about long-term economic damage from the pandemic.
The rise in regional benchmarks echoed the gains on Wall Street, which were led by big technology companies that are benefiting from people staying home during the outbreak.
The MSCI Asia-Pacific Index rose 0.8 percent to 170.66, down 0.2 percent for the week.
The TAIEX on Friday rose 2 percent to 12,607.84, but was down 1.5 percent from last week.
Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 gained 0.2 percent to finish at 22,920.30, down 1.6 percent for the week. The TOPIX added 0.3 percent on Friday, but lost 1.2 percent over the week.
South Korea’s KOSPI on Friday edged up 1.3 percent to 2,304.59, falling 4.3 percent for the week.
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 on Friday inched down 0.1 percent to 6,111.20, down 0.2 percent for the week.
The Shanghai Composite rose 0.5 percent to 3,380.68, bringing its weekly gain to 0.6 percent.
Hong Kong stocks climb on Friday, helped by IT and consumer firms, but posted a marginal weekly drop as uncertainty over Sino-US trade talks weighed on sentiment.
The Hang Seng Index (HSI) rose 1.3 percent to 25,117.47, while the China Enterprises Index (HSCE) gained 0.7 percent to 10,221.90.
Leading the gains for the day, the Hang Seng IT index and the Hang Seng consumer staples index climbed 1.5 percent and 2 percent respectively.
However, for the week, the HSI shed 0.3 percent, while the HSCE slipped 0.5.
Market participants were watching out for developments on trade talks between Washington and Beijing.
The administration of US President Donald Trump on Thursday declined to acknowledge any plans to meet with China over their “phase one” trade deal after the Chinese Ministry of Commerce said that bilateral talks would be held “in the coming days” to evaluate the agreement’s progress.
Chinese purchases of US goods are running well behind the pace needed to meet a first-year increase of US$77 billion specified in the deal, according to official data.
However, China has increased the pace of farm product purchases in the past few weeks.
Reports that Pfizer Inc’s vaccine is on track to seek October regulatory review boosted sentiment, despite uncertainty about global growth, IG Group PLC market strategist Jingyi Pan (潘婧怡) said in Singapore.
Pfizer and its German partner, BioNTech AG, said they would take their COVID-19 vaccine candidate with the fewest side effects into final-stage testing.
It is one of a handful of experimental vaccines to reach end-stage tests around the world.
“Asia markets have broadly tailed Wall Street with gains, aided also by the latest vaccine news boost to sentiment,” Pan said.
Additional reporting by Reuters, with staff writer
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