Japanese Market Rally Higher; Up 3%

(RTTNews) - The Japanese stock market is sharply higher on Friday, snapping a four-session losing streak, with the benchmark Nikkei 225 surging more than 800 points to break above the 27,000 mark, following the broadly positive cues from global markets overnight, with sharp gains across most sectors, led by exporters and technology stocks, despite US inflation data coming in hotter than expected in September. The yen also hit a 24-year low against the dollar.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 Index is gaining 846.49 points or 3.23 percent to 27,083.91, after touching a high of 27,103.04. Japanese stocks closed significantly lower on Thursday.

Market heavyweight SoftBank Group is gaining more than 4 percent and Uniqlo operator Fast Retailing is surging almost 7 percent after posting a profit for the full year. Among automakers, Honda is adding almost 2 percent and Toyota is up more than 1 percent.

In the tech space, Advantest and Tokyo Electron are gaining almost 2 percent each, while Screen Holdings is edging down 0.1 percent.

In the banking sector, Mizuho Financial is gaining more than 1 percent, while Sumitomo Mitsui Financial and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial are advancing more than 2 percent each.

Among major exporters, Canon is gaining more than 2 percent, Mitsubishi Electric is adding more than 3 percent, Panasonic is advancing almost 3 percent and Sony is surging almost 5 percent after inking a JV with Honda to produce premium electric vehicles in 2025.

Among the other major gainers, Mitsubishi Motors is surging more than 5 percent, while NTT Data, TDK and Dentsu Group are gaining almost 5 percent each. Eisai Co., Rakuten, Hoya, Yamaha, and Olympus are all adding more than 4 percent each, while Nissan Motor, Ricoh and Daiichi Sankyo are up almost 4 percent each.

Conversely, there are no major losers.

In the currency market, the U.S. dollar is trading in the lower 147 yen-range on Friday.

On Wall Street, stocks showed a substantial turnaround over the course of the trading session on Thursday following an early sell-off, stocks. The major averages climbed well off their lows of the session and firmly into positive territory.

The major averages finished the session not far off their best levels of the day. After plunging by nearly 550 points in early trading, the Dow spiked 827.87 points or 2.8 percent to 30,038.72. The Nasdaq also surged 232.05 points or 2.2 percent to 10,649.15, while the S&P 500 jumped 92.88 points or 2.6 percent to 3,669.91.

The major European markets also moved to the upside over the course of the session. While the German DAX Index surged by 1.5 percent, the French CAC 40 Index jumped by 1.0 percent and the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index rose by 0.4 percent.

Crude oil futures settled higher on Thursday, gaining after three straight days of losses, as data showed a significant drop in distillate inventories in the U.S. in the week ended October 7. Oil prices drifted lower over the past three sessions amid concerns about the outlook for energy demand due to the rising possibility of a global recession. West Texas Intermediate crude oil futures ended higher by $1.84 or about 2.1 percent at $89.11 a barrel.