In This Article:
TOKYO (AP) — Asian shares were mostly higher on Tuesday after a rally on Wall Street led by gains in Microsoft following its announcement that it was hiring Sam Altman, former CEO of OpenAI, the ChatGPT maker.
U.S. futures were higher while oil prices fell.
Chinese markets were lifted by a report in the financial magazine Caixin that regulators have drafted a list of property developers who will be able to tap low-cost financing. The moves to facilitate more lending come as the real estate industry remains mired in a crisis brought on by a crackdown on excessive borrowing and worsened by a broad economic slowdown.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng jumped 1% to 17,958.33, while the Shanghai Composite added 0.5% to 3,082.30.
“Hopes continue to build that China’s unabating and deepening property slump ... will catch a break, if not stage a turnaround; in particular, as Beijing steps up stimulus efforts to backstop the downward spiral in the wider housing eco-system,” Tan Boon Heng of Mizuho Bank said in a commentary.
Tokyo's benchmark Nikkei 225 edged down nearly 0.1% to 33,362.07. Australia's S&P/ASX 200 rose 0.2% to 7,073.30 and South Korea's Kospi gained 0.9% to 2,512.38.
On Wall Street, the S&P 500 gained 0.7% to 4,547.38, coming off its third straight winning week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average added 0.6% to 33,151.04 and the Nasdaq composite climbed 1.1%, to 14,284.53.
Microsoft was the strongest force pushing the market higher, and it rose 2.1% after saying was hiring Sam Altman for a new venture following his sudden dismissal as CEO of OpenAI. Microsoft said it will also continue its partnership with OpenAI, as fervor around artificial-intelligence technology and the huge profits it’s expected to create wow Wall Street.
Stocks broadly drifted higher throughout the day before they took a turn upward in the afternoon when yields fell in the bond market following an auction of Treasurys. Easing Treasury yields have driven a strong rally for stocks in recent weeks.
This week is relatively light on reports that could sway the hopes on Wall Street that have underpinned that drop in Treasury yields.
Investors are convinced that inflation is cooling enough for the Federal Reserve to finally be done with its market-crunching hikes to interest rates. Traders also are moving up their expectations for when the Fed could actually begin cutting interest rates.
Despite Fed officials saying they may keep rates high for a while to ensure high inflation is definitively beaten, traders are thinking the first cut to rates could happen by early summer or maybe even by March. Cuts to rates tend to act like steroids for financial markets and offer oxygen across the financial system.