BLBG:Asian Stocks, Oil Advance on Greece Aid Deal as Yen Weakens
Asian stocks rose for a fifth day and oil climbed after Europe reached a deal on aid for Greece. The yen slid after the leader of the party favored to win next month’s elections called for more aggressive monetary easing.
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index (MXAP) advanced 0.5 percent as of 2:48 p.m. in Tokyo. Futures on the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index added 0.2 percent. Oil gained 0.4 percent to $88.08 a barrel. The yen weakened 0.2 percent to 82.28 per dollar, falling against all 16 major currencies. The euro touched this month’s high of $1.3009, before trading 0.1 percent stronger on the day at $1.2986.
“They jumped the latest hurdle in the debt crisis, and the market is taking a sigh of relief,” said Hitoshi Asaoka, a Tokyo-based senior strategist at Mizuho Trust & Banking Co., a unit of Japan’s third-largest bank by market value. “Greece’s budget crunch will probably resurface a few times.”
Euro-area finance ministers cut Greece’s interest rates and gave the nation more time to pay back loans while dismissing calls for debt relief. Shinzo Abe, leader of Japan’s opposition Liberal Democratic Party, repeated a call for the Bank of Japan to step up monetary easing. Profit growth at China’s industrial companies quickened to 20.5 percent in October from 7.8 percent the previous month, the government reported today, adding to signs of a pickup in the world’s second-biggest economy.
More than three stocks rose for every two that fell on the MSCI Asia Pacific Index, which is headed for its longest winning streak since mid-September. The gauge rose 13 percent from this year’s low on June 4 through yesterday as central banks added stimulus to spur economic growth and data showed a slowdown in China may be ending.
Samsung, CSL
Japan’s Nikkei 225 Stock Average (NKY) climbed 0.5 percent, headed for its highest close since April. Shares rose more than 8 percent since Nov. 14 when the government called elections that polls suggest are likely to be won by the Liberal Democratic Party. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index rose 0.3 percent, while the BSE India Sensitive Index gained 1.3 percent.
Samsung Electronics Co. rose 1.1 percent in Seoul after saying sales of its Galaxy S III smartphone will reach 40 million units this year. CSL Ltd. (CSL), Australia’s largest drugmaker, surged 7 percent in Sydney to a record after raising its full- year profit growth forecast to 20 percent.
In the fourth Greek crisis meeting in two weeks, euro-area finance chiefs persuaded a skeptical International Monetary Fund that they have a formula for putting the country that triggered the debt crisis onto a path back out of it. Greece was also cleared to receive a 34.4 billion-euro ($44.7 billion) loan installment in December.
“All initiatives decided upon today will bring Greece’s public debt clearly back on a sustainable path,” Luxembourg Prime Minister Jean-Claude Juncker told reporters after chairing a 13-hour meeting that ended early today in Brussels.
The yen fell for the first time in four days after Abe called for inflation target discussions with the BOJ and said bold monetary easing will help correct the yen’s strength. Japan will hold elections on Dec. 16 for the lower house of parliament.
To contact the reporters on this story: Jason Clenfield in Tokyo at jclenfield@bloomberg.net; Yoshiaki Nohara in Tokyo at ynohara1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: James Regan at jregan19@bloomberg.net
