Futures tipped gains at the open for Asia on Wednesday, tracking the advance seen stateside on the back of strong corporate results overnight.
Markets in Japan looked set for a higher open, with Nikkei futures traded in Chicago up 0.29 percent compared to the benchmark’s Tuesday close. Meanwhile, Australian SPI futures were higher by 0.26 percent at the end of the last session.
U.S. stocks mostly rose overnight on the release of strong corporate earnings, with Google-parent Alphabet jumping 3.9 percent after the company reported expectations-topping results after the market close on Monday.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.79 percent, or 197.65 points, to closed at 25,241.94, the S&P 500 rose 0.48 percent to 2,820.40 and the Nasdaq Composite ended the session lower by 0.01 percent at 7,840.77 after climbing more than 1 percent to a record high earlier in the day.
On the trade front, the Trump administration intends to offer as much as $12 billion in aid to support farmers affected by tariffs in ongoing disputes between the U.S. and its trading partners.
U.S. tariffs on $34 billion in Chinese imports took effect earlier this month and were met with retaliatory measures from Beijing that targeted the same value of U.S. goods, including American soybeans among other products.
U.S. President Donald Trump said in a Twitter post earlier on Tuesday that “Tariffs are the greatest! Either a country which has treated the United States unfairly on Trade negotiates a fair deal, or it gets hit with Tariffs. It’s as simple as that – and everybody’s talking!”
That came ahead of his meeting with European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker on Wednesday U.S. time, with talks expected to be focused on American tariffs on steel and aluminum and other trade-related issues.
Earlier in the week, Beijing announced that it would turn to more vigorous fiscal policy, including corporate tax cuts, Reuters reported, with the changes coming in the wake of the U.S.-China trade war.
In currencies, the dollar index, which tracks the U.S. currency against a basket of peers, was mostly steady at 94.608. Against the yen, the dollar traded at 111.24 at 6:59 a.m. HK/SIN.
The economic calendar for Wednesday is light on data, barring Australian second-quarter CPI due at 9:30 a.m. HK/SIN.
Asian corporates scheduled to report results on Wednesday include Hong Kong-listed Hutchison Telecommunications and IMAX China.
