Market Update
Asian markets opened higher Wednesday, inspired by a rebound overnight by U.S. stocks; but the optimism soon faded as bears took over, pushing equities off their initial highs.
After heavy losses yesterday on heels of dismal U.S. manufacturing data, sentiment turned positive at open Wednesday after Wall Street equities rebounded from their own sell-off Tuesday.
However, these gains remained short-lived and indexes turned lower by noon. The Nikkei was the only market that managed to stay afloat; the index was trading up 0.3% at 12:46 pm. Tokyo time.
The Hang Seng was flat while the All Ordinaries lost 0.6%. Mumbai's Sensex was down 0.3% in early trades.
Mainland Chinese markets remained closed for the Lunar New Year Holiday.
Stocks on the Move
Some earnings-related news helped boost sentiment. Panasonic surged over 16% after posting a record net profit of 243 billion yen.
Toyota Motor advanced more than 6% after upgrading its operating profit outlook for the current fiscal year to a record 2.4 trillion yen.
Hitachi also bounced 3.5% after the company raised its outlook for operating profit for the current fiscal year to a record 510 billion yen.
Sony Corp. jumped more than 5% amid reports the electronics exporter might set up a new company with an investment fund to help revive its loss-making Vaio PC unit.
On the downside, Kobe Steel plunged 7.1% after the steel giant said it plans to raise around 100.6 billion yen in share sale this year. The company had raised its full year operating profit outlook, yesterday, to 105 billion yen.
Close rival Nippon Steel & Sumitomo Metal Corp. was up 1.7%.
In Hong Kong, Haitong Securities erased 0.5% after rallying in the wake of the company's announcement of expectations of higher 2013 net profit.
Property developers were on the losers' side, weighing down on the benchmark index.
On the other side, some casino stocks held up well ahead of Macau's casino revenue data due later today. Wynn Macau Ltd. was up 2.6%, Galaxy Entertainment added 1.5% while Sands China gained 1.6%.
In Sydney, miners were trading mixed. BHP Billiton lost 0.7% while Rio Tinto added 0.3%. Fortescue Metals Group climbed 1.7% but gold miner Newcrest slipped 0.3% after yesterday's gains.
On the earnings front in Mumbai, BHEL lost around 2% ahead of its quarterly results but Ranbaxy Laboratories and Power Grid Corp. of India edged up before their respective earnings call.
Reliance Infrastructure Ltd. declined over 1% after the government issued notices to two of its power units for non-payment of power charges amounting to around $70 million.
Among other movers, ITC, NTPC, Tata Motors and Reliance Industries were among the top losers on the BSE-30.