Mild Rebound Seen For Japan Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The Japanese stock market on Friday snapped the three-day winning streak in which it had rallied more than 1,700 points or 3.4 percent. The Nikkei 225 now sits just beneath the 50,500-point plateau although it may tick higher again on Monday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is upbeat on optimism over the outlook for interest rates. The European markets were mixed and the U.S. bourses were up and the Asian markets figure to split the difference.

The Nikkei finished sharply lower on Friday following losses from the technology stocks and automobile producers, while the financial sector offered support.

For the day, the index stumbled 536.55 points or 1.05 percent to finish at 50,491.87 after trading between 50,215.41 and 50,634.85. Among the actives, Nissan Motor tumbled 1.91 percent, while Mazda Motor cratered 3.32 percent, Toyota Motor tanked 2.29 percent, Honda Motor contracted 1.78 percent, Softbank Group surged 5.96 percent, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial collected 0.58 percent, Mizuho Financial eased 0.02 percent, Sumitomo Mitsui Financial climbed 1.00 percent, Mitsubishi Electric sank 0.71 percent, Sony Group stumbled 1.95 percent, Panasonic Holdings slumped 1.28 percent and Hitachi dropped 1.49 percent.

The lead from Wall Street is positive as the major averages opened higher on Friday and bounced up and down all day but always remained in the green.

The Dow added 104.05 points or 0.22 percent to finish at 47,954.99, while the NASDAQ gained 72.99 points or 0.31 percent to close at 23,578.13 and the S&P 500 rose 13.28 points or 0.19 percent to end at 6,870.40.

For the week, the NASDAQ added 0.9 percent, the Dow climbed 0.5 percent and the S&P rose 0.3 percent.

The modest strength on Wall Street followed the release of closely watched consumer price inflation data that was in line with estimates, reinforcing recent optimism about the outlook for interest rates ahead of this week's Federal Reserve meeting.

CME Group's FedWatch Tool is indicating an 87.2 percent chance the Fed will lower interest rates by another quarter point this week.

Crude oil prices edged higher on Friday on persistent geopolitical tension due to the Russia-Ukraine war and the U.S.-Venezuela standoff. West Texas Intermediate crude for January delivery was up $0.35 or 0.59 percent at $60.02 per barrel.

Closer to home, Japan will release Q3 figures for gross domestic product later this morning. In the second quarter, GDP was down 0.4 percent on quarter and 1.8 percent on year.

Japan also will see October numbers for current account and November data for bank lending and the eco watchers index. In September, the current account surplus was Y4.483 trillion. In October, overall bank lending was up 4.1 percent on year and the eco watchers index had a score of 49.1.