Asian stocks follow Wall Street higher
By JOE McDONALD, Associated Press
Sep 20, 2018 10:49 PM CDT
A currency trader works near screens showing the foreign exchange rate at the foreign exchange dealing room in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Sept. 21, 2018. Asian stocks rose Friday after Wall Street hit a new high and a survey showed Japanese manufacturing accelerating. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)   (Associated Press)

BEIJING (AP) — Asian stocks rose Friday after Wall Street hit a new high and a survey showed Japanese manufacturing accelerating.

KEEPING SCORE: Tokyo's Nikkei 225 rose 0.5 percent to 23,793.35 and Hong Kong's Hang Seng added 0.9 percent to 27,712.47. The Shanghai Composite Index climbed 0.3 percent, erasing earlier losses, to 2,737.27 while Sydney's S&P-ASX 200 advanced 0.6 percent to 6,204.40. Seoul's Kospi was up 0.2 percent at 2,327.87 and benchmarks in Taiwan and Southeast Asia rose. New Zealand declined.

WALL STREET: The Dow Jones industrial average and Standard & Poor's 500 index set records as a wave of buying pushed prices higher. Technology stocks, banks and health care companies accounted for much of the rally. Energy companies declined along with crude oil prices. The S&P 500 rose 0.8 percent to 2,930.75. The Dow gained 1 percent to 26,656.98. The Nasdaq composite climbed 1 percent to 8,028.23.

ANALYST'S TAKE: "The resilience in the U.S. market is evident here and the breakout further renews the momentum," said Jinyi Pan of IG in a report. Still, "warning signs are abundant" amid U.S.-Chinese trade tensions, Pan said. "Cautiousness in the form of stop losses may be ever so important with the uncertainty in post-tariffs exchanges lingering into next week."

TRADE TENSION: The latest U.S. tariff hike on Chinese goods in a dispute over Beijing's technology policy takes effect Monday, when Washington imposes an additional 10 percent tax on $200 billion of imports. The tariffs will rise to 25 percent on Jan 1. Beijing announced it would retaliate by imposing tariffs of 5 or 10 percent on $60 billion of U.S. goods including coffee, honey and industrial chemicals.

JAPANESE MANUFACTURING: A preliminary version of Japan's monthly purchasing managers' index showed factory activity accelerated in September. The PMI rose to a three-month high of 52.9 from August's 52.5 on a 100-point scale. The measure of new export orders rose to a four-month high.

ENERGY: Benchmark U.S. crude fell 12 cents to $70.20 per barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract lost 55 cents on Thursday to close at $70.32. Brent crude, used to price international oils, advanced 1 cent to $78.23 per barrel in London. It tumbled 70 cents the previous session to $78.22.

CURRENCY: The dollar gained to 112.70 yen from Thursday's 112.46 yen. The euro was little-changed at $1.1779.

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