Japanese Market Notably Higher

(RTTNews) - The Japanese market is notably higher on Thursday, extending the gains in the previous session, following the mixed cues from Wall Street overnight. The Nikkei 225 is moving above the 51,250 level, with gains across most sectors led by technology and financial stocks. Index heavyweights were weak.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 Index is up 202.28 points or 0.40 percent to 51,265.59, after touching a high of 51,326.09 earlier. Japanese shares ended modestly higher on Wednesday.

Market heavyweight SoftBank Group is losing almost 4 percent and Uniqlo operator Fast Retailing is down almost 1 percent. Among automakers, Toyota is edging up 0.2 percent and Honda is also edging up 0.4 percent.

In the tech space, Advantest and Screen Holdings are advancing more than 3 percent each, while Tokyo Electron is edging up 0.4 percent.

In the banking sector, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial and Mizuho Financial are adding almost 3 percent each, while Sumitomo Mitsui Financial is up more than 2 percent.

Among the major exporters, Mitsubishi Electric and Sony are gaining more than 1 percent each, while Canon is edging up 0.5 percent. Panasonic is losing almost 1 percent.

Among other major gainers, M3 is skyrocketing more than 23 percent, Isuzu Motors is soaring almost 12 percent, Furukawa Electric is surging more than 9 percent and Haseko is jumping more than 7 percent, while Sumitomo Pharma, Sumitomo Electric Industries, Renesas Electronics and Orix is adding more than 5 percent each. Shimizu is gaining more than 4 percent and Fujikura is advancing almost 4 percent, while Tokyo Electric Power, Nomura Holdings, Tokyo Gas and Kansai Electric Power are up more than 3 percent each.

Conversely, Kuraray and Terumo are losing more than 4 percent each.

In economic news, producer prices in Japan were up 2.7 percent on year in October, the Bank of Japan said on Thursday. That exceeded expectations for an increase of 2.5 percent and was unchanged from the September reading. On a monthly basis, producer prices rose 0.4 percent - easing from the upwardly revised 0.5 percent gain in the previous month (originally 0.3 percent).

Export prices were up 1.0 percent on month and 1.2 percent on year, the bank said, while import prices rose 0.7 percent on month and fell 2.5 percent on year.

In the currency market, the U.S. dollar is trading in the higher 154 yen-range on Thursday.

On Wall Street, the major stock indexes once again moved in opposite directions during trading on Wednesday following the mixed performance seen during Tuesday's session. While the Dow climbed to a near record closing high, the tech-heavy Nasdaq showed another moderate move to the downside.

The Nasdaq fell 61.84 points or 0.3 percent to 23,406.46, but the S&P 500 inched up 4.31 points or 0.1 percent to 6,850.92 and the Dow climbed 326.86 points or 0.7 percent to 48,254.82.

Meanwhile, the major European markets moved to the upside over the course of the session. While the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index inched up by 0.1 percent, the French CAC 40 Index jumped by 1.0 percent and the German DAX Index surged by 1.2 percent.

Crude oil prices plummeted on Wednesday after OPEC's monthly report suggested that global supply now exceeds demand by about 500,000 barrels per day. West Texas Intermediate crude for December delivery was down $2.62 or 4.31 percent at $58.40 per barrel.