Japanese Market Significantly Higher

Snapping the two-sessions of declines, the Japanese market is trading significantly higher on Thursday, following the mixed cues from Wall Street overnight. The Nikkei 225 moved above the 32,400 level, with gains in index heavyweights, exporters and technology stocks.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 Index is up 270.38 points or 0.84 percent to 32,436.86, after touching a high of 32,497.74 earlier. Japanese stocks closed modestly lower on Wednesday.

Market heavyweight SoftBank Group is gaining almost 1 percent and Uniqlo operator Fast Retailing is adding almost 2 percent. Among automakers, Toyota is gaining almost 1 percent and Honda is adding more than 1 percent.

In the tech space, Advantest is edging up 0.1 percent and Tokyo Electron is gaining almost 3 percent, while Screen Holdings is edging down 0.3 percent.

In the banking sector, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial are losing almost 1 percent each, while Mizuho Financial is edging down 0.2 percent.

Among the major exporters, Canon and Panasonic are edging up 0.3 percent each, while Mitsubishi Electric is gaining almost 2 percent. Sony is losing more than 2 percent.

Among other major gainers, Kao is surging almost 6 percent, Casio Computer is gaining more than 5 percent, Nintendo is adding almost 5 percent and LY Corp. is up more than 4 percent, while FUJIFILM and Daikin Industries are rising almost 4 percent each. Nissan Motor, Tokyu, Lasertec and NEC are advancing more than 3 percent, while NTT Data, Mazda Motor and Sumitomo Pharma are up almost 3 percent each.

Conversely, Fujikura is plummeting more than 12 percent, Sharp is plunging 8.5 percent, Recruit Holdings is losing more than 5 percent, Ricoh is declining almost 5 percent and DeNA is down almost 3 percent.

In economic news, overall bank lending in Japan was up 2.8 percent on year in October, the Bank of Japan said on Thursday – coming in at 609.507 trillion yen. That’s down from 2.9 percent in September. Excluding trusts, bank lending rose an annual 3.1 percent to 532.259 trillion yen, easing from the 3.2 percent growth in the previous month.

The Ministry of Finance said that Japan posted a current account surplus of 2.734 trillion yen in September. That missed forecasts for a surplus of 3.00 trillion yen following the 2.142 trillion yen surplus in August.

Imports were down 18.1 percent on year to 8.718 trillion yen, while exports rose an annual 2.6 percent to 9.060 trillion yen for a trade surplus of 341.2 billion yen. The capital account showed a deficit of 58.5 billion yen, while the financial account posted a surplus of 3.003 trillion yen.

In the currency market, the U.S. dollar is trading in the higher 150 yen-range on Thursday.

On Wall Street, stocks showed a lack of direction over the course of the trading day on Wednesday, with the major averages bouncing back and forth across the unchanged line after trending higher over the past several sessions.

The major averages eventually ended the session narrowly mixed. While the Dow edged down 40.33 points or 0.1 percent to 34,112.27, the Nasdaq crept up 10.56 points or 0.1 percent to 13,650.41 and the S&P 500 inched up 4.40 points or 0.1 percent to 4,382.78.

Meanwhile, most European stocks moved to the upside on the day. The French CAC 40 Index advanced by 0.7 percent and the German DAX Index climbed by 0.5 percent, although the U.K.’s FTSE 100 Index bucked the uptrend and edged down by 0.1 percent.

Crude oil prices fell sharply on Wednesday amid concerns about the outlook for demand and a jump in U.S. crude oil inventories. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for December lost $2.04 or about 2.6 percent at $75.33 a barrel.

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