Hong Kong’s Hang Seng jumps 2% as major Asia-Pacific indexes rise more than 1%
SINGAPORE — Shares in Asia-Pacific rose in Thursday morning trade, with Hong Kong stocks leading gains.
In morning trade, the Hang Seng index in Hong Kong jumped 2.2% as shares of Chinese tech giants Tencent and Alibaba rose 3% and 4.44%, respectively.
The Nikkei 225 in Japan rose 1.43% while the Topix index climbed 0.66%. South Korea’s Kospi advanced 1.09%.
Elsewhere, shares in Australia also rose, with the S&P/ASX 200 up 0.69%.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan traded 1.17% higher.
Mainland China markets remain closed on Thursday for the holidays.
Overnight stateside, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 102.32 points to 34,416.99 while the S&P 500 gained 0.41% to 4,363.55. The Nasdaq Composite edged 0.47% higher to 14,501.91.
Those gains on Wall Street came on the back of rising optimism over a U.S. debt ceiling deal. Global markets have had a choppy October start so far amid fears over rising rates and inflation.
The benchmark U.S. 10-year Treasury yield recently crossed 1.5% and has largely sustained above that level, last sitting at 1.5276%.
Currencies and oil
The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of its peers, was at 94.241 after recently rising from below 94.2.
The Japanese yen traded at 111.41 per dollar, stronger than levels above 111.6 seen yesterday. The Australian dollar changed hands at $0.7282 following yesterday’s bounce from below $0.724.
Oil prices were lower in the morning of Asia trading hours, with international benchmark Brent crude futures down 0.27% to $80.86 per barrel. U.S. crude futures shed 0.59% to $76.97 per barrel.
