Asia-Pacific markets largely rose as two of the three Wall Street’s major indexes hit record highs on Thursday night and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy says that he is confident a deal can be struck on the U.S. debt ceiling by next week.
The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite jumped on Thursday to notch their highest closing levels since August 2022 as Wall Street traders kept focused on debt ceiling negotiations.
Leaders from the Group of 7 will be gathering in Hiroshima, Japan for the G-7 summit that kicks off today.
Japan stocks marked its best week since October as the Nikkei 225 rose 0.77% and ended at 30,808.35, maintaining the highest levels since 1990 and the Topix climbed 0.18% to 2,161.69— marking its sixth winning streak. Japan’s core inflation in April rose 3.4% year-on-year, maintaining levels above the central bank’s target.
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 inched up 0.59% to end the day at 7,279.5, while South Korea’s Kospi gained 0.89% to close at 2,537.79 and the Kosdaq closed 0.27% higher at 841.72
Greater China markets meanwhile bucked the trend: Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index fell 1.5% and the Shanghai Composite slid 0.42% in mainland China to end at 3,283.54. The Shenzhen Component was up 0.12%, closing at 11,091.36.
Overnight in the U.S., all three major indexes were up for a second straight day, with the Nasdaq gaining 1.51% and hitting 52-week highs, while the S&P added 0.94%. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 0.34%
