Tokyo stocks up on cheap yen

TOKYO: Tokyo stocks rallied Wednesday morning, as a cheaper yen boosted hopes for Japan Inc's profits with investors looking to minutes from the US central bank's latest meeting due later Wednesday.

Toshiba's volatile shares soared nearly 12 percent before ending the morning 6.5 percent higher at 247.3 yen.

The stock jumped on a Nikkei business daily report that the troubled conglomerate -- mired in losses at its US nuclear unit --  was holding a meeting with US partner Western Digital over the sale of its prized memory chip business.

The two firms, which jointly operate a chip plant in Japan, have clashed over cash-strapped Toshiba's plans to sell the division, seen as key to its survival.

The dollar was changing hands at 111.84 yen, up from 111.82 yen in New York and well up from the levels below 111 yen in Asia earlier Tuesday.

A cheaper yen is positive for shares of Japanese exporters as it inflates the value of their repatriated profits.

"The yen is trading at levels that make people feel comfortable, a plus for local corporate earnings," Mitsushige Akino, an executive officer at Ichiyoshi Investment Management, told Bloomberg News.

Tokyo's benchmark Nikkei 225 index added 0.48 percent, or 94.59 points, to 19,707.87 by the break, while the Topix index of all first-section issues advanced 0.49 percent, or 7.63 points, to 1,572.85.

Investors appeared to shrug off news that Moody's cut its credit rating on China -- a major trading partner with Japan -- over concerns about its growing debt mountain.

Tokyo's rise followed a fourth straight winning session for Wall Street, as US President Donald Trump's administration released a 2018 budget that seeks huge cuts over 10 years to a category of spending that includes key social and "mandatory" programmes for lower-income Americans.

Investors will be keeping an eye on the release of minutes from the US central bank's May meeting hoping for clues about future interest rate hikes.

"Investors may want to refrain from going after fresh highs before seeing the minutes," said Toshiyuki Kanayama, a senior market analyst at Monex Inc.

Some major exporter shares rose with Sony up 1.64 percent at 4,022 yen and Toyota tacking on 0.13 percent to 6,008 yen.