Japanese Market Sharply Higher; Up 2%

(RTTNews) - The Japanese stock market is sharply lower on Thursday, extending the losses in the previous session, with the Nikkei 225 just a tad below the 28,000 mark, following the broadly positive cues from Wall Street overnight, with gains across most sectors, led by exporters and technology stocks, even as the yen continues its plunge to a fresh 24-year lows.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 Index is up 559.87 points or 2.04 percent to 27,990.17, after touching a high of 27,998.31 earlier. Japanese stocks closed significantly lower on Wednesday.

Market heavyweight SoftBank Group is gaining more than 2 percent and Uniqlo operator Fast Retailing is adding more than 1 percent. Among automakers, Honda is edging up 0.2 percent and Toyota is gaining almost 2 percent.

In the tech space, Screen Holdings and Tokyo Electron are adding more than 2 percent each, while Advantest is gaining more than 1 percent.

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

Among the major exporters, Canon and Sony are gaining almost 2 percent each, while Mitsubishi Electric is adding more than 2 percent and Panasonic is advancing more than 3 percent.

Among the other major gainers, NTN is surging almost 6 percent, while Daiichi Sankyo and BANDAI NAMCO are gaining more than 4 percent each. Keyence, Sumitomo Pharma, Nippon Telegraph & Telephone, Olympus and Resona Holdings are adding almost 4 percent each, while Isetan Mitsukoshi, Takashimaya, Showa Denko K.K., Panasonic, Nitto Denko, Rakuten and Omron are all up more than 3 percent each.

Conversely, there are no major losers.

In economic news, Japan's gross domestic product expanded an annualized 3.5 percent on year in the second quarter of 2022, the Cabinet Office said on Thursday, beating expectations for a gain of 2.9 percent and up from 0.1 percent in the previous three months. On a seasonally adjusted quarterly basis, GDP climbed 0.9 percent - again beating forecasts for 0.7 percent following the flat reading in the three months prior.

The value of overall bank lending in Japan was up 1.9 percent on year in August, the Bank of Japan said on Thursday, coming in at 587.929 trillion yen. That follows the downwardly revised 1.7 percent increase in July (originally 1.8 percent).

Japan posted a current account surplus of 229.0 billion yen in July, the Ministry of Finance said on Thursday, down 86.6 percent from a year ago. That was week shy of expectations for a surplus of 713.5 billion yen following the 132.4 billion yen deficit in June.

In the currency market, the U.S. dollar is trading in the lower 144 yen-range on Thursday.

On Wall Street, stocks moved sharply higher over the course of the trading day on Wednesday, regaining ground following the notable downward move seen over the past several sessions. The major averages all showed strong moves to the upside, with the tech-heavy Nasdaq snapping a seven-session losing streak.

The major averages finished the session just off their best levels of the day. The Dow jumped 435.98 points or 1.4 percent to 31,581.28, the Nasdaq soared 246.99 points or 2.1 percent to 11,791.90 and the S&P 500 surged 71.68 points or 1.8 percent to 3,979.87.

Meanwhile, the major European markets turned in a mixed performance on the day. While the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index slumped 0.9 percent, the French CAC 40 Index closed just above the unchanged line and the German DAX Index rose by 0.4 percent.

Crude oil prices fell sharply on Wednesday on concerns about the outlook for energy demand amid rising fears of a global recession. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for October ended lower by $4.94 or 5.7 percent at $81.94 a barrel, the lowest settlement since January 11.