Thursday, 12 March 2015 18:02
TOKYO: Tokyo stocks rose 1.10 percent Thursday morning, as a weak yen boosted exporters and overshadowed another loss on Wall Street.
The Nikkei 225 index at the Tokyo Stock Exchange added 205.14 points to 18,928.66 by the break, while the Topix index of all first-section shares climbed 1.11 percent, or 17.0 points, to 1,542.67.
On Wall Street the Dow fell 0.16 percent, the S&P 500 shed 0.19 percent and the Nasdaq eased 0.20 percent as a stronger dollar stoked worries about the impact on US exporters.
The greenback has pushed to multi-year highs — including its strongest level against the euro in 12 years — on speculation that the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates as early as summer after Friday’s strong US jobs report.
The dollar’s ascent against the yen is generally good for Japanese exporters as it makes them more competitive overseas and inflates the value of their repatriated profits.
Tokyo has also been winning support from an inflow of cash from the country’s public pension fund — the world’s biggest — as it shifts more of its bond-heavy portfolio into stocks.
“Japanese company exports are increasing and the domestic economy is recovering nicely,” Mitsushige Akino, executive officer of Ichiyoshi Asset Management, told Bloomberg News.
“The US market is stuck on rate-hike expectations and European stock gains, in dollar terms, are withering away with the weaker euro… Japanese stocks are in favour.”
On forex markets, the dollar rose to 121.67 yen from 121.44 yen in New York.
The euro fell to $ 1.0514 from $ 1.0548 in US trade — after hitting a fresh 12-year low of $ 1.0510 Wednesday — and to 127.86 yen from 128.10 yen.
Equity markets are keeping a close eye on the euro-dollar pair after the European Central Bank this week launched a massive government bond-buying stimulus programme.
In Tokyo share trading, major exporters were among the gainers with Toyota rising 0.87 percent to 8,229.0 yen, rival Nissan jumped 2.02 percent to 1,263.0 yen and Sony added 0.26 percent to 3,265.0 yen.
Japan Airlines added 3.42 percent to 3,930.0 yen on slumping oil prices.
Brother Industries dropped 5.19 percent to 1,901.0 yen after the office equipment firm said it would buy Britain’s Domino Printing Sciences in a $ 1.5 billion deal.
Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2015
