Japanese Nikkei surges as Asia-Pacific stocks rise after Wall Street surge

SINGAPORE – Stocks in the Asia-Pacific region rose on Wednesday morning, after an overnight rebound in the United States that saw the Dow Jones Industrial Average rise more than 500 points.

In Japan, the Nikkei 225 led the gains among the region’s major markets with a gain of 1.3% while the Topix index was up 1.42%.

Japan’s exports rose 48.6 percent in June from a year earlier, according to data released Wednesday by the country’s finance ministry. This was higher than a 46.2% increase expected by economists in a Reuters poll.

Mainland China stocks were also higher, with the Shanghai composite gaining 0.75% while the Shenzhen component rising 0.995%. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index rose 0.19%.

Elsewhere, the S & P / ASX 200 in Australia climbed 1.22%.

Australia’s retail sales fell 1.8% in June from the previous month on a seasonally adjusted basis, preliminary retail data from the country’s Bureau of Statistics showed on Wednesday.

As a result of this data release, the Australian dollar changed hands at $ 0.7319, still above the above $ 0.742 levels seen last week.

South Korea’s Kospi fell behind as it slipped 0.17%.

The MSCI’s largest Asia-Pacific stock index outside of Japan traded up 0.37%.

Overnight in the United States, the Dow Jones Industrial Average jumped 549.95 points to 34,511.99. The S&P 500 jumped 1.52% to 4,323.06 while the Nasdaq Composite rose 1.57% to 14,498.88.

Those gains were a return from Monday’s losses, which saw the Dow Jones plunge more than 700 points amid fears that a Covid resurgence could slow the economic recovery.

The US dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of its peers, was at 93 after hitting levels above 93.1 recently.

The Japanese yen was trading at 109.88 to the dollar, lower than the levels below 109.5 seen against the greenback earlier in the week.

Oil prices were down on the morning of trading hours in Asia, as international benchmark Brent crude futures fell 0.4% to $ 69.07 a barrel. US crude futures fell 0.48% to $ 66.88 a barrel.