Tokyo stocks gain, shrugging off falls on Wall Street
Tokyo, (MILLAT ONLINE):Tokyo stocks closed higher Friday, shrugging off declines on Wall Street, with sentiment buoyed by hopes for Japanese corporate reports as the earnings season approaches.
The Nikkei 225 index gained 0.19 percent, or 44.69 points, to 23,808.06, leaving it up 0.65 percent over the week.
The broader Topix index was up 0.69 percent, or 12.88 points, at 1,889.74, giving it a weekly gain of 0.72 percent.
“Early gains were slightly eroded by a strong yen,” Toshikazu Horiuchi, a broker at IwaiCosmo Securities, told AFP.
“But the market has been sustained by expectations of strong earnings as corporate results season is set to begin next week,” Horiuchi said.
Investors will focus on monetary policy meetings in Japan and the eurozone next week, with the United States expected to raise the benchmark interest rate three times this year.
On Thursday, Tokyo shares closed lower on late profit-taking after the key Nikkei index temporarily broke above the 24,000-mark for the first time in more than 26 years.
The Nikkei is likely to continue trading around the 24,000-mark “given the favourable conditions of the world economy”, Okasan Online Securities said in a commentary.
Nintendo surged 4.22 percent to 48,320 yen after jumping more than two percent the previous day on plans to launch Nintendo Labo, a cardboard DIY play kit for its Switch console.
The success of the console has boosted earnings expectations, lifting Nintendo’s shares.
Canon was 0.62 percent higher at 4,331 yen after a report in the Nikkei business daily that the company will step up its payments of debts linked to the acquisition of a medical equipment business from Toshiba in 2016.
But SoftBank fell 0.28 percent to 9,184 yen after it officially became the largest shareholder of US ride-hailing app Uber.
In New York, US shares pulled back from records Thursday hit by concerns about a possible US government shutdown and lofty equity evaluations.
The dollar traded at 110.82 yen in Asian afternoon trade, against 111.02 yen in New York late Thursday.