SINGAPORE — Shares in Asia-Pacific rose in Thursday morning trade, following an overnight bounce on Wall Street after oil prices fell sharply from a recent surge.
The Nikkei 225 in Japan jumped 3.03% while the Topix index climbed 3.13%. South Korea’s Kospi also gained 2.16%.
In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 climbed 1.08%. Shares of major miner Rio Tinto, however, plunged more than 6%. The firm told CNBC on Thursday that it is “in the process of terminating all commercial relationships it has with any Russian business.”
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan traded 0.63% higher.
Overnight stateside, the S&P 500 gained 2.57% to 4,277.88. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 653.61 points, or 2%, to 33,286.25. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite jumped 3.59% to 13,255.55.
Those gains on Wall Street came as oil prices on Wednesday sharply declined, with both international benchmark Brent crude and U.S. crude futures tumbling more than 10%.
Oil prices had been on a wild ride in recent days, briefly rising to their highest levels since 2008, as Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine has sparked fears of supply disruptions in the commodities space.
Currencies
The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of its peers, was at 97.968 after a recent decline from around 99.
The Japanese yen traded at 115.95 per dollar, weaker than levels below 115.2 seen against the greenback earlier this week. The Australian dollar was at $0.731, off lows below $0.726 seen earlier in the week.
— CNBC’s Will Koulouris contributed to this report.
