Asia Stocks Rising As Investors Digest US-China Trade Talks

As investors digested developments on trade talks between the United States and China, Asia markets were mostly higher on Friday.

The Nikkei 225 in Japan rose 0.7% to close at 23,303.32 while the Topix index added 0.73% finishing its trading day at 1,696.67.

As shares of life insurer AIA gained 0.79%, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index closed largely flat at 26,326.66.

South Korea’s Kospi closed 1.07% higher at 2,162.18 as shares of chipmaker SK Hynix jumped 2.16%.

Monitoring US-China trade developments

Investors continued to watch U.S.-China trade developments. As we know, the events that are taking place now may play a huge role in future economic development.   The two trade giants’ diplomatic relationship has been under considerable pressure.

According to White House economic adviser, Larry Kudlow, Washington is getting close to a trade deal with Beijing.

Both powerhouses are holding deep discussions about a ‘phase one’ deal, Chinese Ministry of Commerce spokesman Gao Feng said.

At a weekly press conference, Fang said that the U.S.-China trade war has begun with adding tariffs and should end by canceling these additional tariffs.

According to Fang, this is an important condition for both countries to reach an agreement.

A professor of trade policy at Cornell University, Eswar Prasad, thinks that the current situation does not look good.

Moreover, according to Prasad, the prospects for even a ‘phase one’ deal have weakened in the last few days.

Now the Chinese might be quite reluctant to make a significant compromise as the atmosphere in Washington seems very unpredictable, says Prasad.

He thinks that even if they compromise, it could get rolled back.

Overall results

Despite the gain in Asian markets, some mainland Chinese stocks still dropped on the day.

The Shanghai Composite dropped 0.64% to around 2,891.34 and the Shenzhen component was lower 1.01% to 9,647.99.

The Shenzhen composite also fell from 1.134% to about 1,605.70.

Overall, the MSCI AC Asia ex-Japan index was 0.56% higher.