Tokyo shares close higher
Tokyo stocks closed higher on Wednesday following gains on Wall Street, as investors awaited all-important US inflation data for clues on the future of Federal Reserve rate hikes.
The benchmark Nikkei 225 index gained 1.03 percent, or 270.44 points, to end at 26,446.00, while the broader Topix index climbed 1.08 percent, or 20.37 points, to 1,901.25.
Traders were in a wait-and-see mode ahead of the release of the US consumer price data later in the day.
Global investors breathed sighs of relief after Fed chair Jerome Powell did not make major news headlines in a speech, letting them return to buying on Wall Street.
Investors are increasingly expecting the US Fed will hike rates by 0.25 percentage points rather than 0.5 as they see cooling inflation pressure.
"Admittedly, there is still some residual uncertainty on the 25bp vs. 50bp question because the FOMC minutes were inconclusive, so Thursday's CPI release will be an essential input into the Fed decision," said Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management.
The dollar stood at 132.29 yen against 132.21 yen seen in New York.
In Tokyo trading, Sony Group jumped 3.49 percent to 11,100 yen while SoftBank Group added 0.26 percent to 5,969 yen.
Uniqlo operator Fast Retailing firmed 1.41 percent to 81,450 yen after the company said will raise the wages of thousands of its employees in Japan by up to 40 percent.
Department stores were lower after Beijing said it would suspend the issuing of visas for Japanese and South Korean citizens in response to measures imposed by Tokyo and Seoul on arrivals from mainland China, where Covid cases are surging.
Isetan Mitsukoshi Holdings dropped 2.97 percent to 1,335 yen while Takashimaya tumbled 2.26 percent to 1,767 yen.
A Prague court acquitted billionaire former Czech prime minister Andrej Babis in an EU subsidy fraud case on Monday, only four days before he runs in a presidential election.
Babis was charged for helping take his Stork Nest farm south of Prague out of his giant Agrofert food, chemicals and media holding to make it eligible for a $2-million European Union subsidy for small companies.
"The deed described in the indictment is not a crime," Judge Jan Sott said after delivering the verdict.
The 68-year-old Babis, who served as prime minister from 2017 to 2021, has always denied any wrongdoing, calling the trial "a political process" ahead of the presidential election starting on Friday.
Alongside former high-ranking NATO general Petr Pavel and economist Danuse Nerudova, Babis is one of three odds-on favourites to reach a second-round run-off scheduled for the end of January.
"NOT GUILTY! I'm very glad that we have an independent judiciary and that the court confirmed what I had been saying from the start," Babis said in a tweet.
The Slovak-born populist, who is the fifth wealthiest Czech according to Forbes magazine, was charged alongside his former aide Jana Nagyova, who was also acquitted.
Neither of the two appeared in court on Monday morning.
Babis is chairman of the opposition ANO, a centrist populist movement which narrowly lost a general election in 2021 to a three-party centre-right coalition led by the current premier, Petr Fiala.
ANO still tops opinion polls, scoring around 30-percent support.
Babis, who is also facing accusations that he served as a Communist secret police agent in the 1980s, currently sits as a lawmaker.
He was charged by police in 2017 and indicted in March 2022 after parliament had stripped him of his immunity.