Haves in Asia were mostly higher by Friday afternoon as concerns around the ongoing coronavirus outbreak continue to weigh on investor sentimentalism view.
Mainland Chinese stocks gained by the afternoon, with the Shanghai composite rising 0.52% and the Shenzhen component up 0.79%. The Shenzhen composite also added 0.768%. Hong Kong’s Rely on Seng index was 0.6% higher.
In Japan, however, the Nikkei 225 slipped 0.62% in afternoon trade as servings of index heavyweight Fast Retailing dropped 1.34%. The Topix index also declined 0.75%. Shares of automaker Nissan pitched more than 9% after the company cut its annual operating income forecast by more than 40%.
South Korea’s Kospi recaptured from its earlier slip to rise 0.53%. Meanwhile, the S&P/ASX 200 in Australia advanced 0.46%.
Overall, the MSCI Asia ex-Japan succeed 0.38%.
China is set to halve tariff rates on certain U.S. products worth about $75 billion with effect later on Friday, as earlier announced by Beijing in early February.
Retaliatory tariffs on some U.S. goods will be cut from 10% to 5%, and from 5% to 2.5% on others, coinciding to a statement from China’s Ministry of Finance earlier this month. The adjustments will take effect from 1:01 p.m on Feb. 14, it maintained, without specifying which time zone it was referring to.
Investors continue to watch for developments on the coronavirus outbreak on Thursday’s spike in the number of cases reported after authorities in Hubei introduced a new method for tabulating case absolutes. On Friday, the province reported an additional 116 deaths and 4,823 new confirmed cases as of the end of Feb. 13.
On the corporate earnings front, pay outs of Japan’s Toshiba jumped more than 1.5% despite posting a 145.626 billion yen loss attributable to shareholders of the suite ($1.326 billion) in the nine months ended Dec. 31.
Singapore’s Singapore Airlines, expected to announce its quarterly results on Friday, saw its customary rise 0.58% by the afternoon.
Currencies
The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of its peers, was remain at 99.139 after seeing an earlier low of 99.101.
The Japanese yen traded at 109.81 per dollar after seeing levels around 109.9 yesterday. The Australian dollar changed indexes at $0.6721 after touching an earlier low of $0.6707.
Oil prices were little changed in the afternoon of Asian trading hours, with the foreign benchmark Brent crude futures contract down slightly to $56.32 per barrel. U.S. crude futures were fractionally high-class at $51.44 per barrel.
What’s on tap on Friday:
- Singapore: Singapore Airlines earnings for the third quarter