Most of the Asian equity benchmarks are trading higher in the early deals on Monday. On the regional front, the Japanese stock market dropped, following the US markets that extended their losses in last session, on a stronger yen and as financial shares led losses and SoftBank Corp. tumbled. China’s stocks rose, sending the benchmark index to its biggest gain in a week, on speculation the government is accelerating reform of state-owned enterprises to support the economy. Among other markets in the Asia-Pacific region, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Shanghai and Taiwan are notably higher and Indonesia and South Korea are up marginally, while, Singapore is trading notably lower.
Hang Seng gained 83.18 points or 0.34% to 24,615.61, KOSPI Index increased by 0.91 points or 0.04% to 2,074.01, Jakarta Composite added 1.25 points or 0.02% to 5,090.06, Shanghai Composite improved by 24.96 points or 1.14% to 2,210.27, FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI spurted by 6.92 points or 0.37% to 1,870.26 and Taiwan Weighted was up by 42.03 points or 0.45% to 9,308.54.
On the flip side, Nikkei 225 tumbled by 19.32 points or 0.12% to 15,503.79 and Straits Times was down by 20.04 points or 0.60% to 3,324.38.