Asian stocks rose, with the benchmark regional index erasing losses since the March 11 earthquake in Japan, as a jobs report boosted optimism in the
U.S. economy and Chinese companies posted earnings that beat analyst estimates.
HTC Corp. (2498), the Taiwanese maker of mobile phones that gets about half of its sales from America, and Toyota Motor Corp., the world’s No. 1 carmaker, rose at least 0.9 percent after a report showed U.S. companies added more workers in March. Industrial & Commercial Bank of
China Ltd., the world’s largest lender by market value, and rival Bank of Communications Ltd. gained at least 1.1 percent in Hong Kong after posting 2010 earnings that surpassed analyst estimates.
“There’s been solid earnings from Chinese companies and U.S. data has also been encouraging,” said Ng Soo Nam, the Singapore-based chief investment officer at Nikko Asset Management Co., which oversees about $126 billion. “The worst of the nuclear crisis in
Japan could be behind us.”
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index rose 0.3 percent to 135.19 as of 12:23 p.m.
Tokyo, heading for its highest close since March 10, the day before Japan’s strongest
earthquake on record struck the nation. About the same number of stocks advanced as declined in the measure, which is set for a 1.7 percent decline this month.
Gains today helped trim the index’s loss this quarter to 1.8 percent. The gauge, which was trading around 135.10 on March 11 before the earthquake and the ensuing tsunami struck, tumbled to as low as 121.69 on March 15.
Economic Impact
The Asia-Pacific gauge last week had its biggest weekly gain since November as Japan moved to stabilize nuclear reactors damaged by the earthquake and as companies from Cnooc Ltd. to Bank of China Ltd. reported earnings that surpassed estimates.
Japan’s
Nikkei 225 (NKY) Stock Average was little changed, paring earlier gains of as much as 0.6 percent after a report showed the nation’s manufacturing deteriorated at the fastest pace in at least nine years in March, underscoring forecasts the economy will shrink in the aftermath of the earthquake.
“It’ll take more time for the impact of the earthquake on the economy to be clear,” said Mitsushige Akino, who oversees about $450 million in Tokyo at Ichiyoshi Investment Management Co.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index increased 0.2 percent.
South Korea’s Kospi Index,
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 Index and
New Zealand’s NZX 50 Index all gained 0.1 percent. China’s Shanghai Composite Index declined 0.9 percent.
U.S. Employment
Futures on the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index slid 0.1 percent today. The index rose 0.7 percent yesterday, extending its biggest first-quarter rally in 13 years, as a report from ADP Employer Services showed U.S. companies hired 201,000 workers in March, marking the third time in four months that the nation added more than 200,000 jobs.
A Labor Department report tomorrow may show total U.S. non- farm payrolls rose 190,000 in March and the
unemployment rate held at 8.9 percent, economists predict. The jobless rate fell below 9 percent in February for the first time in 22 months.
HTC, which counts America as its biggest market, climbed 3.2 percent to NT$1,130 in Taipei. Toyota Motor Corp., which gets about 30 percent of sales from
North America, gained 0.9 percent to 3,360 yen in Tokyo. Techtronic Industries Co., the maker of Hoover vacuum cleaners and Ryobi power tools, advanced 1.2 percent to HK$10.54 in
Hong Kong.
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index lost 2.1 percent this year through yesterday, compared with gains of 5.6 percent by the S&P 500 and 1 percent by the Stoxx Europe 600 Index. Stocks in the Asian benchmark are valued at 13.6 times estimated earnings on average, compared with 13.7 times for the S&P 500 and 11.2 times for the Stoxx 600.
A gauge of finance companies posted the biggest advance among the 10 industry groups in the MSCI Asia Pacific Index. All but three of the sub-indexes gained.
Chinese Banks Climb
Industrial & Commercial Bank of China, the nation’s biggest lender, rose 1.1 percent to HK$6.45 in Hong Kong. The company said full-year net income increased 28 percent to 165.2 billion yuan ($25.2 billion) from a year earlier. That exceeded the 163.8 billion yuan average estimate of 19 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.
Bank of Communications, China’s fifth-largest lender, climbed 2.2 percent to HK$8.50 after saying full-year net income rose 30 percent to 39 billion yuan from a year earlier. That beat the 38 billion yuan average estimate of 17 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg.
Energy companies fell after crude oil for May delivery declined 0.5 percent to settle at $104.27 a barrel on the
New York Mercantile Exchange yesterday. Inpex Corp., Japan’s biggest energy explorer, lost 1 percent to 626,000 yen.
Woodside Petroleum Ltd. (WPL), Australia’s No. 2 oil and gas producer, sank 1.9 percent to A$46.86.
Emas masih bergerak flat menguji area resistance dikisaran 1431.68. Pecahnya level resistance tersebut membuka peluang penguatan lanjutan menuju area resistance selanjutnya dikisaran 1447.35. Namun sementara itu, waspadai terjadinya koreksi menuju area trendline jika emas gagal menembus area resistance. Hal tersebut juga dimungkinkan oleh kondisi CCI dan juga stochastic yang telah berada dalam area overbought.
Indeks Nikkei dibuka langsung merosot hingga 1 persen terutama terkait anjloknya saham TEPCO (operator reaktor nuklir) terkait kekhawatiran krisis kerusakan nuklir yang berkepanjangan. 
Bursa saham Jepang bergerak melemah diawal perdagangan hari Selasa, dengan saham-saham kendaraan yang melemah terkait kekhawatiran persediaan setelah Toyota Motor Corp yang melaporkan bahwa akan menghentikan sementara seluruh produksi di pabrik-pabrik Amerika Utara karena kekurangan suku cadang. Indeks harga saham rata-rata turun 0.5% ke level 9,669.82, sementara indeks Topix turun 0.6% di level 854.27. Saham Toyota Motor Corp turun 1.4%, sementara Honda Motor Co turun 1.5% dan Nissan Motor Co merosot 1.1%. Beberapa saham bluechip juga turun, dengan saham Panasonic yang turun 1.6% dan Elpida Memory Inc turun 1.8%.
Spot emas beranjak naik hari Senin (04/04), didukung oleh stabilitas mata uang euro. Valuta tunggal optimis karena ECB diperkirakan segera menaikkan tingkat suku bunga pekan ini. Harga minyak yang kuat juga menguntungkan emas. 
Emas turun untuk ditutup di bawah $1,429 pada hari Jumat setelah bagusnya data pekerjaan AS mengangkat dollar, namun kecemasan hutang zona Eropa dan keresahan politik di Timur Tengah mengangkat emas dari level rendah.
Data Non-Farm Payrolls A.S atau tenaga kerja di luar sektor pertanian akan menjadi perhatian utama pasar hari ini di akhir pekan. 
Setelah berhasil mencapai area 1.6150, sterling terkoreksi hingga ke area 1.6017 dan saat ini tengah meguji resistance di 1.6042. Jika harga berhasil naik ke atas resistance tersebut, maka diperkirakan harga selanjutnya akan bergerak ke area 1.6083. Akan tetapi, waspadai jika ada penurunan ke bawah 1.6017, apalagi bila diikuti oleh tembusnya support di 1.5985, karena itu berarti akan mengkonfirmasi terbentuknya pola head and shoulders dan pergerakan selanjutnya diperkirakan ke area 1.5935 atau bahkan 1.5885.
Pola bullish flag yang terlihat di grafik 4 jam telah terkonfirmasi setelah penembusan ke atas area 1.4130, dan harga telah berhasil naik menguji area 1.4247. Pullback sedang terjadi saat ini untuk menguji area support di 1.4130, di mana jika support tersebut tembus, maka koreksi kemungkinan akan terus berlanjut hingga ke area 1.4057 atau area major trendline. Sebaliknya, penembusan atas resistance yang berada di area 1.4247 berpotensi akan melanjutkan pergerakan sesuai dengan target bullish flag paling tidak ke kisaran 1.4364.
Data Non-Farm Payrolls A.S atau tenaga kerja di luar sektor pertanian akan menjadi perhatian utama pasar pada akhir pekan ini. 
Sterling sedikit terkoreksi dan tengah berada di kisaran resistance 1.6092. Sinyal bearish sudah muncul dari stochastic dan CCI 1 jam sehingga jika harga tetap bertahan di bawah 1.6092, maka peluang untuk koreksi ke area 1.6062 atau bahkan 1.6013 cukup besar. Sebaliknya, pergerakan ke atas 1.6112 justru akan memperbesar potensi bullish ke 1.6140.
