Bloomberg News
Investors continued to buy risk assets and sell havens Tuesday, as Asian stocks extended gains while the yen and gold fell further.
“The world’s financial markets are the very picture of calm and tranquility, where the short sellers are getting squeezed and the bulls are once again dominating,” said Chris Weston, chief market strategist at IG Markets in a note to clients.
Japan’s Nikkei Stock Average NIK, +1.18% rose 1% and hit its best intraday level in a month as the yen continued to pull back. The dollar JPYUSD, -0.286220% was recently at ¥109.40 versus ¥108.35 at the end of local equities trading Monday.
Japanese exporters benefited from the yen weakening; Nintendo 7974, +3.27% rose 2.4% after climbing 1.9% Monday.
Taiwan’s Taiex Y9999, +0.36% rose 0.4% on Tuesday and it could set a fresh 27-year closing high. It was lower on Monday ahead of Apple Inc.’s AAPL, +1.81% widely anticipated product launch. Taiwan is home to many key Apple suppliers.
New Zealand’s benchmark NZ50GR, -0.14% was 0.2% lower as Auckland International Airport AIA, -1.37% and Fletcher Building FBU, -0.49% were down 1% each.
Overnight in the U.S., the S&P 500 SPX, +1.08% set a fresh record closing high, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, +1.19% finished above 22,000 for the first time in nearly a month. Both also logged their biggest point gains since March 1.
“Investors were relieved that Hurricane Irma did not cause as much damage to Florida as Harvey did to Texas,” said Kathy Lien, head of forex strategy for BK Asset Management in New York.
The U.S. dollar held on to Monday’s gains, when the WSJ Dollar Index logged its biggest one-day rise since Jan. 18. It was essentially flat in Asian trading. Oil was also steady while gold fell slightly after Monday’s 1.1% drop, which was the largest in two months.
