China market gains, HSI rally – MASHAHER

Asia-Pacific markets rose on Thursday, led by Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index and the mainland Chinese markets which extended gains toward the session close.

Chinese and Hong Kong stocks finished sharply higher after state media on Thursday afternoon announced that China’s top leaders held a meeting that affirmed the government’s latest efforts to support the economy. 

Chinese President Xi Jinping led a meeting earlier Thursday of the Politburo, the second-highest circle of power in the ruling Chinese Communist Party, state media said.

The readout said leaders called for strengthening fiscal and monetary policy support. They also called for “halting” the decline of the real estate market and spurring its “stable recovery,” according to a CNBC translation of the Chinese text.

The People’s Bank of China on Tuesday announced a slew of interest rate cuts and said it would extend existing support for the real estate market by two years, among other plans.

The Hang Seng Property Development and Management Index was up 10% on the news, led by Longfor and Vanke.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index advanced 3%, reaching its highest level since May, while mainland China’s CSI 300 extended its winning streak to the seventh day, hitting its highest levels in nearly two months. The index was 1.58% higher.

Japan’s Nikkei climbed 2.51%, while the broad based Topix was up 2.12%, as the Bank of Japan released minutes of its July meeting.

South Korea’s Kospi jumped 2.41%, powered by gains in chipmaker SK Hynix, which surged over 8%, while the small-cap Kosdaq gained 2.18%.

SK Hynix announced on Wednesday that it had begun mass production of the world’s first 12-layer HBM3E chip, which are used in AI memory applications.

Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 was 0.98% higher.

Overnight in the U.S., both the Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 slid and retreated from their latest records. The broad-based index lost 0.19%, while the 30-stock Dow fell 0.7% despite hitting fresh records in early trading.

The Nasdaq Composite eked out a narrow gain of 0.04%.

—CNBC’s Brian Evans and Jesse Pound contributed to this report.