BackAsian stocks rise most in 7 weeks as US gauges set records
Japan's Topix index jumped 1.8%. Australia's S&P/ASX 200 Index and South Korea's Kospi index both added 0.9%
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Tokyo: Asian stocks rose the most in seven weeks as investors weighed earnings and after US equity indexes climbed to records.
Nissan Motor Co jumped the most in 11 months after Japan’s second-biggest carmaker reported full-year profit that beat estimates and forecast higher dividends. PanAust Ltd, an Australian copper producer, soared 34% on a takeover bid from Guangdong Rising Assets Management Co. PetroChina Co added 2.8% to its highest close since 25 November in Hong Kong after announcing the sale of assets valued at ¥39 billion ($6.3 billion).
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index rose 1.1% to 139.27 at 6:06 pm in Hong Kong, its biggest advance since 24 March, as all 10 of its industry groups rose. Shares maintained their gains after data showed China’s economic slowdown is deepening.
The US is always the anchor both for confidence and global growth and it seems to be performing quite decently, said Mikio Kumada, a Hong Kong-based global strategist at LGT Capital Partners. It’s very hard for China to surprise the market in a positive way. It basically needs paradigm change.
The S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average both rallied to records on Monday as Internet and small-cap shares increased amid deals activity.
Companies that do business in the US gained. Toyota Motor Corp, a Japanese carmaker that gets 31% of its revenue in North America, rose 2.5% to ¥5,650. Techtronic Industries Co., a power-tool maker that generates 73% of sales in the region, added 1.6% to HK$25.30.
Regional gauges
Japan’s Topix index jumped 1.8%. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 Index and South Korea’s Kospi index both added 0.9%. New Zealand’s NZX 50 Index gained 0.7%. Taiwan’s Taiex index rose 0.1%.
India’s S&P BSE Sensex rose 1.4% to a record. Exit polls showed the main opposition alliance probably won the most seats in national parliamentary elections. Markets in Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Bangladesh were closed for a holiday.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index advanced 0.4% after jumping the most in seven weeks on Monday on optimism state reforms will boost equity markets. The Hang Seng China Enterprises Index of mainland companies traded in the city added 0.3%.
Data today showed China’s industrial output, investment and retail sales growth unexpectedly slowed, suggesting the government’s efforts to counter an economic slowdown have yet to gain traction.
China slowdown
Factory production rose 8.7% in April from a year earlier, the National Bureau of Statistics said on Tuesday in Beijing, compared with the 8.9% median estimate of analysts surveyed by Bloomberg News. Fixed-asset investment increased 17.3% in the first four months of the year, and retail sales advanced 11.9% in April.
China’s broadest measure of new credit fell last month as authorities extended their campaign to tame financial dangers even as construction and manufacturing data point to a worsening slowdown. Aggregate financing was ¥1.55 trillion in April, the People’s Bank of China said on Monday in Beijing, compared with ¥2.07 trillion in March.
Earnings analysis
Among companies on the Asian gauge that reported quarterly results from 1 April through yesterday and for which Bloomberg had estimates, 53% beat profit expectations, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Nissan jumped 5.1% to ¥913 after reporting net income rose 14% to ¥389 billion for the year ended March on better-than-expected fourth-quarter results. The company also plans to make dividend payments of ¥33 per share in the current fiscal year, up from ¥30 the previous period.
PanAust soared 34% to A$2.12, its largest gain since January 2009. Guangdong Rising, a state-owned Chinese investment group, offered to take control of the copper producer in a cash bid that values it at A$1.5 billion ($1.4 billion).
PetroChina, operator of the country’s largest pipeline network, added 2.8 % to HK$9.24. The company will transfer to a separate unit assets including the First and Second West- East Gas Pipelines, which carry natural gas from central Asian countries and China’s energy-rich region of Xinjiang to the nation’s eastern cities, according to a statement to the Hong Kong bourse on Monday. The company will then sell the unit, PetroChina Eastern Pipelines Co. BLOOMBERG
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