SINGAPORE — Shares in Asia-Pacific rose in Friday morning trade following heavy losses for some regional markets in the previous trading day, as investors continue to assess the impact of a potentially faster-than-expected policy tightening by the U.S. Federal Reserve.
The Nikkei 225 rose 0.78% in early trade, recovering partially from its nearly 3% drop on Thursday. The Topix index advanced 0.51%.
South Korea’s Kospi gained 0.52%. Shares in Australia were up in morning trade, with the S&P/ASX 200 rising 1.32%.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan traded 0.29% higher.
Markets have been spooked and fallen sharply since minutes from the Fed’s December meeting, released earlier this week, showed officials at the central bank ready to aggressively dial back policy help.
The yield on the benchmark U.S. 10-year Treasury note rose as high as 1.75% on Thursday, last sitting at 1.7228% — still much higher after ending 2021 at 1.51%. Yields move inversely to prices.
Overnight on Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 170.64 points to 36,236.47 while the S&P 500 shed about 0.1% to 4,696.05. The Nasdaq Composite slipped 0.13% to about 15,080.87.
Currencies
The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of its peers, was at 96.32 — holding above levels below 96 seen earlier this week.
The Japanese yen traded at 115.87 per dollar, stronger than levels above 116 against the greenback seen yesterday. The Australian dollar was at $0.7164 after yesterday’s drop from above $0.72.
