HONG KONG (AP) — Asian stocks were mixed and oil prices extended their gains Friday as talks on ending the war between the U.S. and Iran remained stalled.
U.S. futures also wavered after Wall Street pulled back from its all-time highs.
Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 gained 1% to 59,716.18, led by heavy buying of technology stocks. On Thursday, it hit a record intraday high above 60,000.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng reversed earlier losses to add 0.2%, at 25,976.65, while the Shanghai Composite index edged 0.1% lower to 4,090.48.
South Korea’s Kospi closed nearly unchanged at 6,475.63.
In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 declined 0.1% to 8.786.50.
Taiwan’s Taiex jumped 3.2% as chipmaker TSMC, which makes up a key part of the index, gained 5.1%.
Progress on another round of peace talks between the United States and Iran was limited even after President Donald Trump said Tuesday that the U.S. was indefinitely extending a two-week ceasefire with Iran, a day before it was originally set to expire.
The Strait of Hormuz, a key passageway for global energy where roughly a fifth of the world’s oil and natural gas normally passed through before the war, remains largely closed and a U.S. sea blockade of Iranian ports is still in effect. After the U.S. imposed a blockade on Iranian ports last week, Iran attacked three ships in the strait on Wednesday and seized two of them.
Trump said Thursday that the U.S. military was intensifying its mine-clearing efforts in the strait and he ordered the military to “shoot and kill” small Iranian boats laying mines in the area.
Source: WPLG
