Asian Stocks Advance As Renewed Trump Trade Powers Wall Street

Stocks in Asia advanced in the last session of the week as investors took positive overnight cues from Wall Street with Trump Trade overshadowing Nvidia Inc.'s outlook concerns and geopolitical tensions.

Equity benchmarks in Australia and South Korea led the gains during the session opening. The Nikkei was 189 points, or 0.49%, lower at 38,190, while the S&P ASX 200 was up 64 points, or 0.77%, at 8,387 as of 5:40 a.m.

Meanwhile, Bitcoin continued to touch a new record after a brief pause and was edging closer to the key $100,000. Artificial intelligence giant Nvidia rose to a new intraday high during the session even after it failed to meet the highest revenue forecast.

Stocks in the US also got a small boost after jobless claims came in lower than expected. The jobless claims stood at 2.13 lakh in the week ending on Nov. 16 against the estimated 2.20 lakh.

The dollar climbed against most major currencies on Thursday with the yen a standout exception. Australian and New Zealand bonds were flat on Friday after Treasury yields rose across the curve in the previous session, according to Bloomberg.

Wall Street ended the Thursday session with gains, extending the post-election run. The S&P 500 index and tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite rose 0.53% and 0.03%, respectively. The Dow Jones Industrial Average advanced 1.06%.

On the geopolitical front, Russia said it launched a new kind of ballistic missile into Ukraine a day after the latter fired British cruise missiles at military targets inside Russia. Russian President Vladimir Putin said that no system can counter new Russian missiles and that the US made a mistake ending the missile treaty.

This follows the decision by President Joe Biden’s administration to approve Kyiv’s limited use of the weapons and President Vladimir Putin's signing a decree allowing Russia to fire nuclear weapons.

Crude oil prices saw a sharp gain on following Russia's counterattack and Putin's warning to the US. Crude prices headed for the biggest weekly gain since early October with the Brent crude trading 1.95% higher at $74.23 a barrel as of 6:00 a.m. IST, and the West Texas Intermediate up 0.01% at $70.11.