Japanese Market Sharply Higher; Up 2%

(RTTNews) - The Japanese stock market is trading sharply higher on Tuesday, extending the gains in the previous five sessions, despite the broadly negative cues from Wall Street overnight, with the Nikkei 225 surging over 2 percent near the 42,700 level to record all-time highs, with gains across all sectors led by index heavyweights, technology and financial stocks.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 Index is up 871.83 points or 2.08 percent at 42,692.31, after touching a record all-time high of 42,786.97 earlier. Japanese shares ended sharply higher on Friday ahead of the holiday on Monday.

Market heavyweight SoftBank Group is surging more than 6 percent and Uniqlo operator Fast Retailing is gaining almost 4 percent. Among automakers, Honda and Toyota are adding more than 2 percent each.

SoftBank Group committed about $32.7 billion to OpenAI and agreed to acquire chip designer Ampere Computing for $5.6 billion.

In the tech space, Screen Holdings is gaining 1.5 percent, Advantest is surging more than 7 percent and Tokyo Electron is adding more than 1 percent.

In the banking sector, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial, Mizuho Financial are gaining more than 3 percent each, while Sumitomo Mitsui Financial is adding almost 3 percent.

The major exporters are mostly higher. Mitsubishi Electric is adding 1.5 percent and Sony is up almost 1 percent, while Panasonic and Canon are edging up 0.2 to 0.4 percent each.

Among the other major gainers, Mitsui Mining & Smelting is skyrocketing almost 14 percent and Sharp is soaring more than 8 percent, while CyberAgent and Inpex are surging almost 7 percent each. Lasertec is jumping more than 6 percent and Fujikura is gaining almost 5 percent, while Rakuten, Isetan Mitsukoshi, Disco, Taisei and Mercari are adding almost 4 percent each.

Conversely, Nippon Express is plunging more than 11 percent, Toppan Holdings is tumbling more than 9 percent, Olympus is plunging more than 6 percent and Idemitsu Kosan is losing almost 3 percent.

In the currency market, the U.S. dollar is trading in the lower 148 yen-range on Tuesday.

On Wall Street, stocks showed a lack of direction over the course of the trading session on Monday following the strong upward move seen in the previous week. The major averages spent the day bouncing back and forth across the unchanged line.

The major averages eventually ended the day in negative territory. While the slid 200.52 points or 0.5 percent to 43,975.09, the Nasdaq fell 64.62 points or 0.3 percent to 21,385.40 and the S&P 500 dipped 16.00 points or 0.3 percent to 6,373.45.

Meanwhile, the major European markets turned in a mixed performance on the day. While the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index climbed 0.4 percent, the German DAX Index fell by 0.3 percent and the French CAC 40 Index slid by 0.6 percent.

Crude oil prices edged higher on Monday as Russia shrugged off the U.S. deadline to end its war with Ukraine or face sanctions. West Texas Intermediate crude for September delivery was up $0.17 or 0.27 percent at $64.05 per barrel.