Asian markets trade mostly higher in early deals on Friday

Most of the Asian equity benchmarks are trading higher in the early deals on Friday, tracking the modest gains overnight on Wall Street and the volatility in crude oil prices. Though, Investors are treading cautiously ahead of the release of the closely-watched US jobs data later in the day and as the US dollar weakened, with many countries in the region preparing to celebrate the Lunar New Year holiday next week. US Employment is expected to increase by about 188,000 jobs in January after jumping by 292,000 jobs in December. The unemployment rate is expected to hold at 5.0 percent. Meanwhile, the Japanese stock market is notably lower as exporters' stocks were dragged lower by a stronger yen. Among the other Asian markets, South Korea, Singapore, Indonesia, Hong Kong and Malaysia are marginally higher. Bucking the trend, Shanghai is in negative territory.

Hang Seng added 108.95 points or 0.57% to 19,292.04, KOSPI Index spurt 0.84 points or 0.04% to 1,917.10, FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI gained 5.83 points or 0.35% to 1,662.60, Jakarta Composite increased 108.86 points or 2.33% to 4,774.68, and Straits Times was up by 43.48 points or 1.70% to 2,601.97.

On the flip side, Nikkei 225 declined 328.59 points or 1.93% to 16,716.40, and Shanghai Composite was down by 3.14 points or 0.11% to 2,777.88.