AFP, Hong Kong :
Asia’s major markets mostly rose Monday as investors were cheered by a blockbuster US jobs report last week, while trade was thin owing to the three-day Lunar New Year break.
Expectations that the Federal Reserve will take its foot off the gas in raising interest rates and optimism that China and the United States will eventually hammer out a deal to resolve their long-running trade war were also providing support.
With most of the region closed this week for an extended holiday there are few catalysts to drive business, though dealers took heart from Friday’s strong US non-farm payrolls numbers.
The world’s biggest economy added 304,000 new posts in January, almost double what was expected and the strongest reading for almost a year, while growth in pay held steady above inflation.
All three main indexes on Wall Street ended with gains and that filtered through to Asia.
Hong Kong ended 0.2 percent higher and Tokyo climbed 0.5 percent, with Sony plunging more than eight percent after lowering its annual sales forecast on Friday and flagging weak profits in its PlayStation business.
Sydney also rose 0.5 percent though Singapore dipped 0.1 percent.
Bangkok edged up but there were losses in Jakarta, Wellington, Mumbai and Manila.
Shanghai, Seoul, Taipei and several other markets were closed for the
holidays.
Peter Wilmshurst, a portfolio manager at Templeton Global Equities in
Melbourne, said 2019 could see a recovery in equities.
“If we see some sort of inflection in economic growth stabilising, then
people can have more confidence in earnings,” he told Bloomberg TV.
The plunge in prices last year “leaves the valuations of many stocks
around the world looking pretty interesting to us, particularly outside the
US”.
On currency markets the dollar rose, though observers pointed out that the
rally in the greenback from the jobs data was limited as dealers focus on the
Fed’s slower pace of rate hikes.
Asia’s major markets mostly rose Monday as investors were cheered by a blockbuster US jobs report last week, while trade was thin owing to the three-day Lunar New Year break.
Expectations that the Federal Reserve will take its foot off the gas in raising interest rates and optimism that China and the United States will eventually hammer out a deal to resolve their long-running trade war were also providing support.
With most of the region closed this week for an extended holiday there are few catalysts to drive business, though dealers took heart from Friday’s strong US non-farm payrolls numbers.
The world’s biggest economy added 304,000 new posts in January, almost double what was expected and the strongest reading for almost a year, while growth in pay held steady above inflation.
All three main indexes on Wall Street ended with gains and that filtered through to Asia.
Hong Kong ended 0.2 percent higher and Tokyo climbed 0.5 percent, with Sony plunging more than eight percent after lowering its annual sales forecast on Friday and flagging weak profits in its PlayStation business.
Sydney also rose 0.5 percent though Singapore dipped 0.1 percent.
Bangkok edged up but there were losses in Jakarta, Wellington, Mumbai and Manila.
Shanghai, Seoul, Taipei and several other markets were closed for the
holidays.
Peter Wilmshurst, a portfolio manager at Templeton Global Equities in
Melbourne, said 2019 could see a recovery in equities.
“If we see some sort of inflection in economic growth stabilising, then
people can have more confidence in earnings,” he told Bloomberg TV.
The plunge in prices last year “leaves the valuations of many stocks
around the world looking pretty interesting to us, particularly outside the
US”.
On currency markets the dollar rose, though observers pointed out that the
rally in the greenback from the jobs data was limited as dealers focus on the
Fed’s slower pace of rate hikes.
