NIKKEI AT 13 MONTH HIGH AS CYCLICALS STEADY
TOKYO-Japan’s stock index reached 13-month high record last Friday brought by economic optimism. This followed after months of inactivity over conflicting data about Sino-US trade deal progress.
The Nikkei rallied up to 0.26% at 23,391.87 after its highest record of 23, 591.09 on Oct. 10 back in 2018. Its weekly session tallied a 2.37% gain as it sealed its fifth weekly rise.
Topix index soared with 0.27% to 1,702.77, the highest recorded gain in more than a year after trade revenue hit up to 3.12 trillion yen equivalent to $28.6 billion or 47% in the last three months.
The Chinese commerce ministry said that China and US had agreed to pull out imposed tariffs in phases. This was later confirmed by a US official.
Investors are confident that both parties will settle the months-long trade truce even if the scheme was heavily criticized by some of US government’s advisers. This gained criticism as there is no information yet regarding the time and date of the trade pact signing.
If you think corporate earnings will recover from here, you can expect further rise in share prices. Investors are now starting to expect such a scenario, which you can tell from the fact that cyclicals such as financials and energy shares are doing well,” said Takuya Hozumi, global investment strategist at Mitsubishi UFJ Morgan Stanley.
Car and steel suppliers’s gains inched higher at 1.4% as banks hit 0.9%.
Toyota soared with 2.2% as it reached its four-year highs as buy buck plan and better-than-expected quarterly session heavily contributed to the said gain.
Terumo rose with 13.4% following the firm’s disclosure of strong earnings from July to September.
Isetan Mitsukoshi acquired 11.7% gains after the department store operator disclosed a well-ended session as it announced share buyback.
Kirin Holdings earned 9.6% following their buy-back announcement, tallying 6.8% of its shares.
Decliners such as Shiseido lost 8.3% after the cosmetic company cut its negative sales forecast in South Korea and Hong Kong.
Rakuten plummeted with 4.5% as investments in e-commerce and mobile units put its quarterly operating profit at risk of getting wiped out.