Asia report: Most markets higher despite ongoing Korea threat

Most markets in Asia were higher on Wednesday, with traders taking their cues from the green finish on Wall Street overnight and seemingly shrugging off recently renewed concerns over North Korea.

In Japan, the Nikkei 225 was up 0.74% at 19,506.54, as the yen weakened 0.13% to JPY 109.85 against the dollar.

Reports emerged during the session that technology conglomerate Toshiba could miss its self-set 31 August deadline to sell its memory chip division.

Its shares were down 3.45%, in contrast to most of the rest of the Japanese tech sector.

Toshiba stock was ahead on Tuesday, after it emerged US memory giant Western Digital would join the latest consortium bid for the division.

Western Digital is already in joint venture with Toshiba at a memory manufacturing facility, and had protested when it was excluded from previous consortium negotiations.

Toshiba has been trying to flog off its valuable memory chip division for months in a bid to shore up a cash crisis, stemming at least in part from the failure of its US nuclear development division Westinghouse.

On the economic front, retail sales in Japan for July were ahead 1.9% compared to a year ago - well ahead of the 1% consensus forecast.

On the mainland, the Shanghai Composite was off 0.07% at 3,362.99, and the smaller, technology-heavy Shenzhen Composite was 0.35% higher at 1,938.90.

South Korea’s Kospi added 0.32% to 2,372.29, while the Hang Seng Index in Hong Kong jumped 1.19% to 28,094.61.

In Seoul, technology firm LG Electronics made a bid for ZKW Group, a headlight manufacturer based in Austria.

It was understood a preferred bidder for the company would be selected next month - LG’s shares were up 10.62% on the news.

Wednesday’s performance contrasted with the softness seen on Tuesday, as traders reacted to North Korea’s launch of a ballistic missile over Japan earlier in the session.

Market participants on Wall Street showed little of that sentiment in the US overnight, however, with the major indices in New York finishing stronger.

“The risk off sentiment that overshadowed markets after the launch of yet another missile from North Korea didn't even last 24 hours,” noted National Australia Bank’s director of economics David de Garis.

Oil prices were lower during Asian trading, even as gasoline futures in the US surged as almost a fifth of the country’s refining capacity was offline as a result of ex-Hurricane Harvey.

A number of analysts believed that the serious and widespread flooding seen around the Houston area could leave some refiners closed for the rest of the week.

Brent crude was last down 0.7% at $51.64 per barrel, while West Texas Intermediate slid 0.43% to $46.24.

In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 eked out gains of 0.01% to settle at 5,669.72, with decent gains in the consumer stables and information technology sectors offset by a 5.66% drop for the telecommunications services subindex.

Former state monopoly telecom utility Telstra was down 6.25%, after it confirmed it would abandon plans to further monetise National Broadband Network income.

Australia’s National Broadband Network has largely been seen as a political failure, being watered down from a promise to take high-speed fibre to most of urban Australia to a plan to perform light upgrades on the country’s aging copper phone lines, which were purchased from Telstra.

Across the Tasman Sea, the S&P/NZX 50 was up 0.5% at 7,775.20, led higher by Metro Performance Glass, which was ahead 3.8%.

The glass maker had been sold off heavily since its recent results, with bargain hunters now swooping in.

The down under dollars were mixed, with the Aussie last 0.04% stronger on the greenback at AUD 1.2569 and the Kiwi weakening 0.09% to NZD 1.3799.