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In Asia, stocks rose on Thursday after Wall Street stocks recovered much of their sharp losses from the previous day.
Oil prices fell.
Benchmarks rose in most major markets except Seoul, while markets in mainland China remained closed for the Lunar New Year holiday.
Japan reported its economy contracted at an annual rate of 0.4% in the final quarter of 2023. After a decline of 2.9% in July and September, the country contracted for the second quarter in a row.
Britain also reported that its economy fell into a technical recession in October and December, contracting by 0.3% from the previous quarter.
Japan's nominal GDP was $4.2 trillion, or about 591 trillion yen, last year, making it the world's fourth-largest economy behind the United States, China and Germany. Germany had previously said its GDP would be $4.4 trillion in 2023, or $4.5 trillion depending on currency conversion.
The continued weakness further undermined expectations that the Bank of Japan could tighten its ultra-loose monetary policy and raise its key interest rate from its long-standing level of minus 0.1%. Cheap credit is good for markets, and the Nikkei 225 in Tokyo rose 1.2% to 37,948.35.
In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng index rose 0.6% to 15,971.18.
Australia's S&P/ASX 200 rose 0.8% to 7,605.70. South Korea's Kospi lost 0.3% to 2,613.80.
Taiwan's Taiex rose 3% to a record high of 18,644.57 as TSMC, the world's largest computer chip maker, reported its sales rose nearly 8% in January from a year earlier.
India's Sensex rose 0.4%.
The SET in Bangkok rose 0.1%.
On Wednesday, the S&P 500 rose 1% to 5,000.62, recouping more than two-thirds of its loss on Tuesday. A hotter-than-expected inflation report dampened expectations that the Federal Reserve will soon begin cutting interest rates, a big reason stocks have risen to record levels recently.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 0.4% to 38,424.27 a day later after suffering its worst loss in nearly 11 months. The Nasdaq Composite rose 1.3% to 15,859.15.
The smallest stocks hit hardest by worries about higher interest rates on Tuesday rallied more than the rest of the market. The Russell 2000 index rose 2.4%.
The calm on the bond market helped the situation on Wall Street remain more stable. Treasury yields fell after surging a day earlier on expectations that the Fed would keep interest rates higher for longer. The central bank has already raised its key interest rate to its highest level since 2001 in a bid to slow the economy and bring inflation down to its target.
Nvidia, which has spread a mania around artificial intelligence technology, rose 2.5% on Wednesday. It was the single strongest force lifting the S&P 500 index.
DaVita rose 8.6%, one of the S&P 500's bigger gainers, after the healthcare company reported higher earnings and revenue than analysts expected for its latest quarter.
Most companies in the S&P 500 exceeded analysts' forecasts for the final three months of 2023. Hopes for stronger growth in 2024 due to a solid economy were another reason the S&P 500 has already set 10 records this year.
Shares of Lyft rose 35.1% after the company had a wild ride in over-the-counter trading, fueled in part by a typo in its most recent earnings report. The ride-hailing company reported better results than analysts expected, but also said in its press release that it expects a key profitability metric to improve by 500 basis points, or 5 percentage points. It was later said that it should have been 50 basis points or 0.5 percentage points.
Lyft shares shot up more than 60% in after-hours trading on Tuesday following the typo.
Rival Uber Technologies rose 14.7% after its board approved a program to buy back up to $7 billion of its shares.
On the losing side, Akamai Technologies fell 8.2% after reporting mixed results.
Online vacation rental booker Airbnb fell 1.7% after reporting a $349 million loss in the fourth quarter due to an income tax deal with Italy.
In other trading, U.S. benchmark crude oil fell 20 cents to $76.44 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Brent crude, the international standard, lost 18 cents to $81.42 a barrel.
The US dollar fell to 150.14 Japanese yen from 150.46 yen. The euro rose to $1.0738 from $1.0731.
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