MW: Tokyo, Hong Kong upbeat: BHP shines on oil rise
By Chris Oliver, MarketWatch
HONG KONG (MarketWatch) -- Asian stocks recouped some losses after three straight losing sessions Friday, with commodity producers such as BHP Billiton tracking gains in oil and metals prices while Mazda Motor Corp. led Japanese exporters higher after the yen eased against the dollar.
Stocks sprinted higher in early going, pacing super-sized gains on Wall Street, but momentum faded somewhat in afternoon trading, with investors remaining cautious on the outlook given.
"Skeptics seem to prevail," said Yoji Takeda, head of regional equities at RBC Investment Management Asia. "The downside is fairly limited from here as the market has discounted a lot of bad news, but we'll bounce along the bottom for a while until we seen any improvement in profits."
He added that hedge funds dumping shares to meet investor cash calls by year end likely capped regional gains.
Regional shares were also influenced by futures pointing to weaker start for shares in the U.S., with the futures markets indicating the Dow Jones Industrials to open 100 lower.
Shares of Kyocera Corp. were up 1.8% after the Nikkei newspaper reported the semiconductors and wireless handsets maker will spend 40 billion yen ($411 million) to build a solar cell plant to help meet surging demand for photovoltaic batteries.
Mazda Motor Corp. climbed 3%, leading shares of Japanese exporters higher, helped by a weakening yen against the dollar.
Hong Kong and China were standouts, with their respective stock markets gaining amid speculation that the People's Bank of China could cut interest rates again as early as Friday evening as part of measures to shore up flagging growth.
Japan's Nikkei 225 ended 2.7% higher at 8,462.39, Australia S&P/ASX 200 closed 1.4% higher at 3,748.10 and South Korea's Kospi gave back earlier gains to end little changed at 1,088. In Mumbai, the Sensex index traded 1.5% lower at 9,382.40 in afternoon trade.
Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index closed 2.4% higher at 13,532.66 and China's Shanghai Composite Index added 3.1% to 1,986.44.
"Most of the rally [in the U.S.] came in the final hour of trading, so Asian markets are not too convinced," said Alex Wong, director at Ample Financial Group in Hong Kong, referring to the muted response to the 6.7% rally in the Dow Jones Industrial Average. "People are expecting a rate cut, so this is providing some support to Hong Kong."
Wong, who forecasts the Hang Seng will end the year 10% below current levels, said investors were upbeat on commitments by Beijing to spend heavily on infrastructure, although doubts lingered over whether measures will boost corporate profits in the near term.
Data released Friday showed China's investment in factories, infrastructure and real estate decelerated to 27.2% in the first 10 months of this year, down slightly from a 27.6% gain through September.
Singapore's Straits Times Index added 1%, Taiwan's Taiex was up 0.3% and Bangkok's SET ended 0.3% lower.
Indonesia's JSX Composite added 0.1%, Kuala Lumpur's KLSE Composite rose 0.2% and New Zealand's NZX-50 also tracked higher, adding 1.4%.
In other Tokyo action, Mizuho Financial Group , Japan's second-biggest bank, closed 4.6% lower. The bank said Thursday its fiscal first-half profit fell 71% to 94.58 billion yen, because of bad loans and loses on securities investments.
Japanese exporters were generally upbeat after the yen weakened to the 97.05 level against the U.S. dollar, down from around the upper-95 level in mid-morning Tokyo trade Thursday.
Gainers also included Canon Inc and Toyota Motor Corp. , shares of which rose 2.3% and 2% respectively.
Nippon Steel Corp.'sshares were up more than 1.5%. The gains followed a Friday report by the Nikkei newspaper that Brazil's Vale had dropped its bid for a second price hike this year on iron-ore shipments to the steelmaker.
Shares in Sharp Corp. were up 0.5% after the electronics maker said Thursday it would book a $120 million fine as an extraordinary expense in the current quarter. The fine was levied Wednesday by the U.S. Justice Department for conspiring to fix prices on liquid-crystal displays.
Crude-oil futures for December were down 28 cents to $57.960 a barrel in electronic trading in late Tokyo, after rising 3.7% on the Nymex Thursday.
Of commodities benefiting from gains overnight the in oil price, Sydney-listed shares in Santos Ltd added 4.3%, and Hong Kong-listed offshore driller Cnooc climbed 4.4%, while BHP Billiton climbed 5.6%.
