Seoul city skyline early on December 16, 2020 (Photo: Ed JONES/AFP) (Photo: ED JONES/AFP via Getty Images)
Ed Jones | AFP | Getty Images
Korean Kospi Stocks hit record highs for the second day in a row on Friday, led by gains in chip stocks and defense stocks.
Index major SK Hynix rose 6.15%, and defense giant Hanwha Aerospace rose 8.09%.
The index closed 2.31% higher at 5,808.53.
Other Asia-Pacific markets were mostly lower on Friday after Wall Street’s three main indexes fell overnight, weighed down by a decline in private credit stocks and tensions between Iran and the United States.
The possibility of an attack on Iran has increased after US President Donald Trump said he would call for military action against Iran within the next 10 days.
Oil prices rose further on the news, with U.S. crude oil trading 0.93% higher at $67.05 per barrel on Friday. Brent, the global benchmark, rose 0.33% to $71.9.
Asian traders took stock of Japan’s inflation data, with headline inflation falling below the Bank of Japan’s 2% target in January for the first time in 45 months.
Japanese Nikkei Stock Average The index fell 1.12% to 56,825.7, led by consumer cyclical stocks, while the TOPIX fell 1.13% to close at 3,808.48.
shares of sumitomo pharmaceuticalone of the country’s largest pharmaceutical companies, was volatile in early trading, rising as much as 6.81% before plummeting. The stock closed 15.6% lower.
Separately, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi reportedly warned of China’s “coercion” in her first policy speech to the Diet, saying that China was “intensifying its attempts to unilaterally change the status quo in the East China Sea and South China Sea.”
Takaichi also pledged to end Japan’s “excessive fiscal austerity” and increase investment in areas such as AI, chips and shipbuilding, while adding that the government would not pursue “reckless fiscal policies.”
The yield on 10-year Japanese government bonds fell by 4 basis points.
hong kong Hang Seng Index The index closed 0.98% lower at 26,443.69, dragged down by tech stocks. Markets in mainland China were closed for the Spring Festival holiday.
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 ended marginally lower at 9,081.4.
In the U.S., private credit and software stocks also came under pressure overnight, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average dropping 0.54% and the broader S&P 500 index dropping 0.28%. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index fell 0.31%.
—CNBC’s Sean Conlon and Pia Singh contributed to this report.
Correction: This article has been updated to reflect that Hong Kong markets are open today.
