Nikkei Extends Weekly Gain to 3.9%, Osaka to Sell Rail Road to Nankai

Hiruki Nakamura
21 Feb, 2014
New York City

Stocks in Tokyo gained and for the week the indexes gained the best in the last three months. G20 finance ministers are scheduled for a weekend meeting and discuss the impact of U.S. Fed tapering plan on emerging markets currencies.

[R]4:30 PM Tokyo – Stocks in Tokyo gained and for the week the indexes gained the best in the last three months. G20 finance ministers are scheduled for a weekend meeting and discuss the impact of U.S. Fed tapering plan on emerging markets currencies.[/R]

Stocks in Tokyo gained and the Topix closed the week with the best rise in three months.

The latest minutes of Bank of Japan meeting in January showed that the central bank will pay a closer attention to global developments.

G20 finance ministers are scheduled to meet this weekend and discuss the implication for emerging markets as the U.S.

Federal Reserve winds down its stimulus plan. The so called taper plan has dragged several emerging market currencies lower in the first six weeks of the year.

The Nikkei 225 Stock Average climbed 416.49 or 2.9% to 14,865.67 and the Topix index jumped 27.75 or 2.3% to 1,222.31.

For the week, Nikkei 225 soared 3.9%.

The yen gained to 102.38 against the U.S. dollar.

Stocks in Review

Toyota Motor Corp advanced 122 yen to 5,982 yen. Honda Motor Co jumped 47 yen to 3,699 yen. Nissan Motor Co Ltd rose 10 yen to 919 yen.

Sony gained 25 yen to 1,766 yen.

Softbank Corp climbed 276 yen or 3.7% to 7,802 yen. Fast Retailing Co soared 1,230 yen or 3.6% to 35,755 yen.

Aeon Financial Service Co Ltd surged 8.3% to 2,537 yen after the Japan-based credit card service provider plans to buy back approx 12 million shares for 25 billion yen in this year.

KDDI Corporation gained 2.9% to 5,866 yen after the Nikkei newspaper reported communications service provider forecasted operating profit in the fiscal year ending March 2015 will be above 730 billion yen.

Nikon Corporation jumped 2% to 1,843 yen after the image and video equipments maker has launched NSR-S630D ArF immersion scanner for best performance and productivity for lithography.

Nankai Electric Railway Co Ltd climbed 2.4% to 378 yen after the government of Osaka prefecture is in talk with the company to sell local railway lines for 75 billion yen or $733 million.

The government began the talks after the local law makers rejected the bid from U.S.-based investment fund Lone Star in December to purchase Semboku Rapid Railway, supported by the state and used by 50 million people a year.