Chinese stocks led the fray here in Asia on signs there maybe some easing of credit restrictions, while the USD continued its advance against the other major currency pairs, with a retreating Yen lifting Japanese stocks.
The Shanghai Composite surged nearly 2% higher to 3128 points, rebounding strongly above terminal support at the 3000 point mark. The Hang Seng Index lifted nearly 1% higher to 30531 points, maintaining above support at the 30,000 level and almost a new weekly high as you can see on the daily chart:
S&P futures are stable here, not reacting positively or negatively to todays rally in Asia. As I said yesterday, the Friday high must be beat around 2688 or so for any signs of a bullish move higher:
Japanese stocks finally got some help from a much weaker Yen with the Nikkei 225 closing up nearly 1% higher to 22278 points. Yen fell back even though the USDJPY pair was well overbought, heading almost to the 109 handle during the Asian session. Momentum is reverting to the mean here on the four hourly chart so I do expect a small pullback soon:
The ASX200 was the laggard but still rose about 0.6% to 5921 points, again lead by oversold banking stocks as it crosses over the next resistance level at 5900. The Aussie dollar has finally stopped its selloff – somewhat – stalling here at just below the 76 handle against USD and right on the edge of its daily downtrend channel:
The economic calendar has two major prints tonight that are interconnected – US house prices and consumer confidence.