Stocks in Asia rose on Tuesday on rising hopes the spread of the global coronavirus pandemic may be slowing.
In Japan, the Nikkei 225 index added on 373.88 points, or 2%, to 18,950.18. The moves came after the country’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said fiscal spending under Japan’s stimulus package to arrest the fallout from the coronavirus outbreak will total 39 trillion yen ($357 billion U.S.), according to local media reports.
The Japanese yen traded at 108.79 per U.S. dollar after seeing levels below 108 in the previous trading week.
In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng Index jumped 504.17 points, or 2.1%, to 24,253.29.
Korean markets moved upwards as shares of industry heavyweight Samsung Electronics jumped 1.9% after the firm said its first-quarter profit was likely $5.2 billion U.S., slightly above expectations.
Investors watched for developments on the coronavirus pandemic, with South Korea reporting Tuesday less than 50 new cases of infection for the second day running. China also posted no new deaths as of April 6 for the first time since January when it started publishing daily updates.
Globally, more than 1.3 million people have been infected by the coronavirus while at least 74,169 lives have been taken, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
Australian markets defied the trend and actually went down, as the Reserve Bank of Australia kept its cash rate unchanged as expected by analysts in a Reuters poll.
Following that decision, the Australian dollar changed hands at $0.6186 after an earlier low of $0.6072.
In other markets
In Shanghai, the CSI 300 returned from a long weekend to gain 84.8 points, or 2.3%, to 3,798.02
In Korea, the Kospi index gained 31.72 points, or 1.8%, to 1,823.60.
In Taiwan, the Taiex Index popped 177.65 points, or 1.8%, to 9,996.39.
In Singapore, the Straits Times Index rocketed 101.3 points, or 4.1%, to 2,571.89.
In New Zealand, the NZX 50 recovered 46.03 points, or 0.5%, to 9,809.85
In Australia, the ASX 200 faded 34.52 points, or 0.7%, to 5,252.29