Asia watch

A WAVE of selling that hit shares of

The Nikkei clawed back early losses and rose 146.81 points to 10,431.79, helped by a 3% gain in Toyota Motor shares ahead of its first-half profits. Toyota's figures, which came after the market closed, showed net profits accelerated more than 80% to a record 291bn yen (£1.6bn), as the lower yen helped US sales and provided windfall currency gains.

While big bank stocks rallied from a recent pounding, smaller banks dominated Tokyo trading, led by Asahi Bank, which crashed 15%, triggering accusations from directors that stock market manipulators were at work.

Hong Kong's market surged 2.5% on reports that Chinese nationals would be allowed to buy stocks in Hong Kong companies and other foreign firms that do business on the mainland. Led by Bank of East Asia, the Hang Seng index jumped 258.84 points to challenge recent monthly highs at 10,528.63.

Other China-affiliated companies joined the surge after reports from Beijing that the rules against mainlanders buying foreign shares would be relaxed by allowing them to list on China's domestic stock markets. The overall advance was held back slightly by a 4% fall in the shares of Legend, the mainland's main personal computer maker, after it warned of lagging sales.

Foreign institutions continued to make South Korean stocks their number one target in the region, and the Kospi reversed Wednesday's mild fall and rose 11.74 to 573.77. Overseas buyers dominated trade as they picked up blue-chips with good earnings prospects. SK Telecom led the way with a 6% rise after the mobile phone operator reported earnings were on target for the year. Profit-taking flattened the recent rise in Taiwan stocks, and the Weighted Average slipped 23.12 points to 4135.03.

Buyers tussled with profit-takers in Sydney, taking the S&P/ASX 200 index slightly back from the day's highs with a gain of 16.8 at 3269.4. The All Ordinaries rose 14.9 to 3205.3.

News Corp shares were steady after the company reported that sluggish advertising had cut first-quarter earnings 44% to $83m (£52m). Bank shares charged ahead after National Australia Bank reported a 19% rise in full-year profits. The bank's shares added 0.8% despite continuing concern over its exposure to the US property market through its HomeSide offshoot. Good first-quarter sales took shares in retail giant Coles Myer up almost 7%.

Singapore shares marked time as traders awaited first-half results from Singapore Telecommunications. These came in ahead of analysts' forecasts, and showed a drop of 7% against a consensus forecast of a 23% slide. But the shares still eased by around 1%, and the Straits Times index dropped 5.41 to 1323.09. A 0.59-point rise to 265.81 broke the recent losing streak in Thailand's SET index.

Thin buying took the Kuala Lumpur Composite up 4.02 points to 596.28 in Malaysia, and in Indonesia the Jakarta Composite edged up 0.59 to 378.09.

Prices and indices in this section are supplied from various sources and calculated at different times and may not always match those listed on the site.