Asia-Pacific stocks mixed as S&P 500 sails to record close on Wall Street

Shares in Asia-Pacific were mixed in Friday afternoon trade, following gains overnight on Wall Street that saw the S&P 500 sailing to a record closing high. Stocks in Japan were little changed as the Nikkei 225 hovered above the flatline while the Topix sat about 0.1% lower. Over in South Korea, the Kospi edged 0.6% higher. Mainland Chinese stocks declined as the Shanghai composite fell 0.25% while the Shenzhen component slipped 0.515%. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index advanced 0.39%.

Shares in Australia were higher as the S&P/ASX 200 climbed 0.31%. MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan advanced 0.35%. Overnight stateside, the S&P 500 rose nearly 0.5% to a record closing high of 4,239.18. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 19.1 points to 34,466.24 while the Nasdaq Composite gained 0.78% to 14,020.33. The gains came on the back of the release of a closely-watched U.S. inflation report. U.S. consumer prices jumped 5% in May — the fastest pace since August 2008 — the U.S. Labor Department reported Thursday. That was higher than a gain of 4.7% forecasted by economists surveyed by Dow Jones.

The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of its peers, was at 89.991 after swinging around the 90 level for much of this week.

Asia-Pacific stocks mixed as S&P 500 sails to record close on Wall Street, CNBC, Jun 11