Asian markets follow Wall Street into green territory ahead of US Q3 GDP

Asian stock markets were higher in early hours on Friday following a strong lead from Wall Street as major tech companies showed better-than-expected corporate reports.

Australia ASX -22.30 -0.37% 5,960.20 OPEN

Shanghai Comp +9.55 +0.28% 3,417.12 OPEN

Hang Seng Index +236.05 +0.84% 28,438.43 OPEN

Nikkei 225 +220.88 +1.02% 21,960.66 OPEN

TSEC 50 Index -12.44 -0.12% 10,722.32 OPEN

Wall Street top three indexes ended mostly higher as tech heavyweights reported positive earnings for the third quarter of 2017, including Alphabet, Microsoft, Intel, Twitter and Amazon.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose to 23,400 by the closing bell. The S&P 500 posted a 0.13 percent gain, but the Nasdaq Composite dropped by 0.11 percent to finish at 6556.77.

US benchmarks were also supported by data. The National Association of Realtors’ said pending home sales for Sept. were flat, falling below an originally forecasted increase of 0.2 percent.

The Department of Labor said initial jobless claims rose by 10,000 to a seasonally adjusted 233,000 in the week ended October 21, above an estimated build of 12,000.

Meanwhile, the European Central Bank announced cuts to its monthly asset purchases from the current 60 billion euros to 30 billion euros starting from January 2018. However, the quantitative easing programme will continue to run for at least nine more months.

Currencies rapidly reacted to the news, with the euro falling across the board and letting his major counterpart (the dollar) regain some positions. The pair was around 1.1637 by the time of this writing. The US dollar index stood at 94.71, adding 0.20 percent.

Ahead in Asia, market players will be paying attention to Q3 earnings from companies such as Yahoo, Shapan, China Merchants Bank, Bank of Communications and Kia Motors.

In the United States, focus will be at the release of the third quarter GDP at 12:30 GMT. Analysts are expecting a 2.5 percent increase. Economists believe the economic growth rate will be affected by recent hurricanes Harvey and Irma.

Michigan University consumer expectations and confidence due as of 14:00 GMT.

Fort Financial Services