Key facts
- Asian shares mostly rose Thursday, led by tech gains in Japan and South Korea.
- Major chipmakers' stocks surged following positive earnings from U.S. companies Qualcomm and Micron Technology.
- Oil prices fell over $1, nearing pre-war levels.
- Qualcomm and Micron Technology raised revenue forecasts and saw shares jump.
- Nikkei 225 surged 4.1%, Kospi hit a new record, up 5.9%.
- Wall Street closed mixed Wednesday, with tech giants weighing on the S&P 500 and Nasdaq.
Asian shares were mostly higher Thursday, led by technology-driven gains in Japan and South Korea, as major computer chipmakers’ stocks surged following upbeat earnings reports from U.S. giants like Qualcomm and Micron Technology. Oil prices fell more than $1, bringing them closer to where they were before the war with Iran started.
Qualcomm’s share price surged 12% in afterhours trading after the company announced it had raised its forecast for revenue this year to $40 billion from $22 billion. It also announced a new computer chip for data centers called Dragonfly C1000 CPU that Meta plans to use. Micron Technology’s shares jumped nearly 16% in afterhours trading after it upgraded its forecast and exceeded analysts’ estimates.
In Asian trading, Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index surged 4.1% to 71,995.59 as traders snapped up shares in technology companies. Chipmaker Tokyo Electron’s shares gained 7.1%, while chip testing equipment maker Advantest’s shares soared 13.4%.
South Korea’s benchmark, the Kospi, hit a new record, surging 5.9% to 8,968.22. Samsung Electronics’s shares gained 5.4% and SK Hynix leaped 11.6%.
Elsewhere in Asia, gains were more modest. Taiwan’s Taiex climbed 0.8% and the Sensex in India was up 0.6%. The Shanghai Composite index picked up 0.4% to 4,125.76, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng dropped 1.4% to 23,090.27. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 shed 0.5% to 8,768.20.
On Wednesday, stocks wavered to a mixed close on Wall Street as losses for several tech giants including Microsoft weighed on the market. The S&P 500 fell 0.1% to 7,358.22. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 10.4% to 51,848.90. The tech-heavy Nasdaq composite fell 0.4%, to 25,476.64. Microsoft lost 2.3% and Oracle slumped 4.6%. Many large tech companies have been behind Wall Street’s record-setting run throughout the year, but analysts have warned their valuations may have become stretched.
Google’s parent company Alphabet slipped 0.2%. Alphabet will become the fifth Magnificent 7 tech company to join the Dow, following Apple, Amazon, Microsoft and Nvidia.
Oil companies had some of the biggest losses as prices fell while the U.S. and Iran negotiate a possible end to their war. Exxon Mobil fell 2% and Chevron lost 2.6%. Brent crude, the international standard, fell 3.8% to $73.87 a barrel. U.S. crude prices fell 3.9% to $70.34 a barrel.
Some of the bigger winners on Wall Street included homebuilders following approval of legislation beneficial to the industry. KB Home surged 16.7% and D.R. Horton jumped 6.7%.
The Federal Reserve will get an update on inflation later Thursday, when its preferred measure for prices is released. Economists expect the Personal Consumption Expenditures price index, or PCE, to show that prices rose 4.1% in May. The Fed is worried over inflation, which has been rising as tariffs raise costs for many goods and the war pushed energy and shipping prices higher.
In other dealings early Thursday, the U.S. dollar fell to 161.75 Japanese yen from 161.79 yen. The euro rose to $1.1368 from $1.1359.