TOKYO (AP) – Asian stocks meandered Wednesday, as investor attention turned to upcoming remarks from a European Central Bank official.
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A number of factors have been behind Tuesday’s gains, including strong German economic data and the recovery in the price of oil. Oil had slipped sharply on sunday after a meeting of producing nations in Doha failed to produce an anticipated production freeze.
Still, the tone in global markets remained upbeat. A pact fell apart after Saudi Arabia demanded that Iran join in. A strike in Kuwait temporarily slashed the country’s oil output by more than half, and helped pull crude prices higher. Recall shares, now down 0.2 percent, will cease trading at the close of trade today.
Nikkei 225 paired yesterday’s losses and added 598 points to finish 3.68% higher.
“We’re still seeing a lot of companies struggling to meet that top line of revenue, and that’s the bigger story”, Kinahan said.
MSCI’s all-country world index, which tracks stock performance in 46 countries, gained 1.07 percent, its highest level in five months.
“It’s unsurprising the yen’s recent weakness has reversed given the sour macro sentiment arising from events like the natural disaster, the failure of the OPEC meeting to follow through on the encouraging promise it had shown, as well as smaller geopolitical risks like the impeachment going on in Brazil”.
In the currency market, the Australian dollar is higher against the US dollar on Thursday, aided by rising iron ore and commodity prices. It last traded at $17.03, up 4.7 percent so far this week. A stronger yen is negative for Japanese exporters, as it dilutes overseas earnings when converted into local currency.
Stocks in the health care and consumer discretionary sectors also posted big gains. Rivals Toyota, Honda and Nissan climbed 2-3 percent.
But the yen weakened by only 0.1 to the dollar on the USA market.
For the second time in as many weeks, Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren warned yesterday that futures markets, which see only one modest rate hike in each of the next few years, are off the mark.
In other energy trading, wholesale gasoline fell about 2 cents to $1.44 a gallon.
The gains in energy and mining companies came as prices for oil, copper and other basic materials rose.
The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 climbed 49.50 points or 0.96% to 5,186.60 and the broader All Ordinaries index closed 49.80 points or 0.96% higher at 5,254.70. Goldman’s earnings beat Wall Street’s estimates, even though its profit sank by 56 percent from a year earlier. In the minutes of meeting, RBA said that the impact of the appreciating Australian dollar had raised concerns.
The most recent Bank of Japan Tankan taken on the 1st April, revealed that confidence amongst Japan’s largest manufacturers had reached its lowest level in nearly three years. The S&P 500 closed less than 2 percent from a record high in a session marked by rising energy stocks and a solid quarterly report from pharmaceutical company Johnson & Johnson.
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Still, some market watchers are taking comfort in the declining production in the from of shale players in the U.S. Crude production in the U.S.is forecast to fall to an average of 8.6 million barrels a day in 2016 and 8 million barrels a day in 2017, said the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
