Most major indexes in Asia gained on Friday although the Australian benchmark tracked lower. Wall Street, for its part, closed its Thursday session with slight losses amid political concerns.
Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 was higher by 0.03 percent. The index had touched a fresh 26-year high in the last session, but pulled back from that level later in the day.
Automakers and financials were mostly higher on Friday. Heavyweight Toyota traded flat and Honda gained 0.8 percent. Among technology names, Nintendo rose 3.75 percent, extending gains following its Thursday release of new Nintendo Switch accessories.
In South Korea, the Kospi tacked on 0.04 percent. Automakers were in positive territory, with Hyundai Motor jumping 2.58 percent. Technology plays, however, were mostly lower. Index heavyweight Samsung Electronics erased early gains to decline 1.36 percent while rival SK Hynix fell 2.66 percent.
Down Under, the S&P/ASX 200 was traded 0.16 percent below the flat line. Major mining stocks were lower, with Rio Tinto losing 0.69 percent and BHP edging down by 0.15 percent.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index edged higher by 0.11 percent after notching its third consecutive record close in the last session. Telecommunications names traded higher on the day, with heavyweight China Mobile gaining 0.25 percent. Financials were mixed after recording gains in the previous session.
On the mainland, the Shanghai composite tacked on 0.36 percent and the Shenzhen composite advanced 0.1 percent.
A looming government shutdown stateside was a “binary event” that was affecting risk sentiment in “global markets, including those in Asia,” Rob Carnell, Asia Pacific head of research at ING wrote in a morning note.
U.S. stocks closed lower on Thursday as investors focused on the likelihood of that shutdown. The move lower came despite corporates stateside posting solid quarterly earnings: As of Wednesday, 78 percent of S&P 500 companies that have reported topped expectations, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.
Still, the immediate focus for markets stateside remained a Friday deadline for the U.S. Congress to pass a stopgap funding bill. The House passed a spending bill late on Thursday, although it was less certain how the vote would play out in the Senate.
Yields on the 10-year U.S. Treasury note rose to 2.63 percent, its highest levels since 2016.
The dollar extended losses after edging down in the last session ahead of the Friday deadline stateside. The dollar index, which tracks the U.S. currency against six major peers, traded at 90.387 at 11:45 a.m. HK/SIN after falling as low as 90.113 overnight.
Weakness in the dollar saw the euro and British pound extend overnight gains. The greenback also drifted lower against the yen to fetch 110.89, a touch below Thursday’s close of 111.05.
The Australian dollar rose to trade at $0.8016 in the wake of strong China economic data released in the previous session.
Japan’s SoftBank Group on Thurday became Uber’s largest shareholder after it officially closed a high-profile deal with the ride-hailing company. The deal had valued Uber at around $48 billion, which was a discount to a previous valuation of nearly $70 billion. SoftBank shares were off by 0.17 percent, underperforming most other Japanese tech stocks, which traded higher.
Elsewhere, Ping An Insurance Group has raised almost $1 billion in funding ahead of a planned listing of a medical data unit, Reuters reported, citing sources. Ping An said in a Thursday statement that it was “proactively developing” technologies that supported its main business, but advised “caution when dealing in the securities” of the company. Ping An traded higher by 0.86 percent.
Meanwhile, trade in the shares of Wanda Hotel Development was halted Friday morning. The Hong Kong-listed developer said in a filing that the halt came before “a possible very substantial disposal.”
