TOKYO (dpa-AFX) - The Japanese stock market is sharply higher on Tuesday, with the benchmark Nikkei index breaching the 30,000 mark earlier, as investors continued to buy cyclical stocks on prospects of a stimulus-driven global economic recovery getting brighter. The cues from Wall Street overnight was also positive
The benchmark Nikkei 225 Index is advancing 187.04 points or 0.63 percent to 29,954.01, after touching a high of 30,026.40 earlier. Japanese shares closed slightly higher on Monday.
Market heavyweight SoftBank Group is gaining more than 2 percent and Uniqlo operator Fast Retailing is adding more than 1 percent. Among automakers, Honda is edging up 0.4 percent, while Toyota is losing almost 1 percent.
In the tech space, Advantest is gaining more than 4 percent and Tokyo Electron is adding almost 2 percent. In the banking sector, Sumitomo Mitsui Financial is losing almost 1 percent and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial is down more than 1 percent.
The major exporters mostly mixed, with Canon and Mitsubishi Electric edging up 0.2 percent each, while Panasonic and Sony are gaining almost 2 percent each.
Among the other major gainers, Ebara is rising almost 7 percent and Cyber Agent is adding almost 4 percent, while Nippon Yusen, Taiyo Yuden, Hitachi Zosen and Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha are gaining more than 3 percent each. Sumco, Marubeni and Mitsui OSK Lines are adding almost 3 percent each.
Conversely, Japan Steel works and Shionogi & Co, are losing more than 3 percent each, while Rakuten, Japan Post Holdings and Shizuoka Bank are down more than 2 percent each.
In the currency market, the U.S. dollar is trading in the lower 109 yen-range on Tuesday.
On Wall Street, stocks turned in a lackluster performance for much of the trading session on Monday but managed to end the day mostly higher. With the upward move on the day, the Dow and the S&P 500 reached new record closing highs.
The major averages showed a strong move to the upside going into the close, ending the session near their best levels of the day. The Dow rose 174.82 points or 0.5 percent to 32,953.46, the Nasdaq jumped 139.84 points or 1.1 percent to 13,459.71 and the S&P 500 climbed 25.60 points or 0.7 percent to 3,968.94.
Meanwhile, the major European markets moved to the downside on the day. While the German DAX Index fell by 0.3 percent, the French CAC 40 Index and the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index both dipped by 0.2 percent.
Crude oil futures ended lower on Monday with traders weighing energy demand prospects in the wake of a spike in coronavirus cases in Europe. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for April slid $0.22 or 0.3 percent at $65.39 a barrel.
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