Japan's Nikkei average jumped 3.4 percent in thin trade today, boosted by hopes for a global economic recovery that sent US shares climbing, with Canon and other exporters leading the benchmark higher.
Oil and gas field developer Inpex and other energy-linked shares advanced as oil prices steadied around $74 a barrel today, keeping last week's gains of nearly 10 per cent on optimism about a US economic recovery.
The Dow rose to its highest level in nine months on Friday, boosted by a surprising rise in home sales and comments by Federal Reserve chief Ben Bernanke that the global economy is emerging from a recession.
But market analysts said that despite the jump on Wall Street, investors remained cautious due to uncertainty about the Chinese stock market, whose drop in recent weeks had spooked investors globally, and Japan's general election on August 30th.
Underscoring a cautious mood in the market, turnover volume on the Tokyo exchange's first section hit its lowest level since July 28 at 1.3 trillion yen.
The benchmark Nikkei gained 342.85 points to 10,581.05, erasing a 3.4 per cent decline it posted last week. It is now within sight of its 10-month high of 10,630.38 hit on August 14th.
The broader Topix rose 2.4 per cent to 970.27.
Exporters were some of the biggest winners after a surprising 7.2 per cent jump in July sales of previously owned US homes boosted investor confidence on Wall Street.
Canon, the world's largest digital camera maker, shot up 6.3 per cent to 3,720 yen.
The company ended at the day's high after the company told Reuters in an interview that it plans to restructure its microchip stepper division by December, a move aimed at helping it better compete with ASML and Nikon.
Chip-tester maker Advantest surged 6.9 per cent to 2,415 yen and electronics parts maker Kyocera climbed 5.2 pe rcent to 7,700 yen.
Toyota climbed 2.3 per cent to 4,070 yen, while Honda Motor advanced 3.2 per cent to 3,050 yen.
Oil-linked shares rose. Inpex jumped 5.4 per cent to 758,000 yen, while Nippon Mining Holdings climbed 2.5 per cent to 491 yen and Nippon Oil advanced 2.3 per cent to 542 yen.
Trading houses, which are major dealers in energy and have stakes in oil and gas projects, also gained.
Reuters