Japan's Nikkei stock average edged up 0.2 percent on Wednesday, led higher as Nomura Holdings Inc and other financials gained on hopes that planned investments in US banks would help the sector. Nomura surged after the company said it would buy the Asian and European operations of failed US investment bank Lehman Brothers and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group (SMFG) rose after media reports said.
Japan's third-largest bank planned to invest in US investment bank Goldman Sachs. The decision by Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway to invest $5 billion in Goldman Sachs was also lending support, market players said. But investor worries about the overall economy lingered, boosting defensive shares such as pharmaceuticals, while exporters slid on a firmer yen and kept gains capped.
"Even if the US financial situation is cleared up, worry about the underlying health of the global economy will remain, especially given that economic weakness is growing in Europe," said Masayuki Yamagishi, a strategist with Mitsubishi UFJ Securities. "Investors are still wondering how much real impact the US government rescue plan will have, plus it still hasn't been approved by Congress," he said.
US lawmakers scoffed at the huge size of the proposed bailout - with a $700 billion price tag - and its lack of detail, and US stocks closed down about 1.5 percent on Tuesday on the lack of certainty over when and how Washington would act.
Nomura soared 5.2 percent to 1,505 yen after Japan's top broker said it would buy the Asian and European operations of Lehman Brothers to help it expand overseas. Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group advanced 4.2 percent to 936 yen after Japan's largest bank said it would take a stake in US investment bank Morgan Stanley, while SMFG gained 1.2 percent to 684,000 yen even though the company said it had no plans for an investment in Goldman Sachs at the moment.
"Japanese banks have up to now not extended themselves so much overseas, so these support moves are being taken as positive by investors here," said Takashi Ushio, head of the investment strategy division at Marusan Securities. The benchmark Nikkei ultimately gained 24.44 points in the final moments of trade to 12,115.03. The broader Topix was down 0.1 percent at 1,167.97 after earlier falling more than 2 percent.
Eisai Co Ltd rose 4.8 percent to 4,150 yen, among many pharmaceuticals helping to lift the Nikkei. Shionogi & Co Ltd gained 7.6 percent to 2,275 yen. Takeda Pharmaceutical Co gained 2.7 percent to 5,400 yen after saying on Wednesday it had applied for approval to market in the United States the SYR-322 and the Actos diabetes drugs in a single tablet for the treatment of type 2 diabetes.
NTT Data Corp was the second-biggest contributor to the Nikkei 225 by volume weight, climbing 5.2 percent to 443,000 yen, followed closely by KDDI Corp, which rose 3.3 percent to 598,000 yen. Trade was light on the Tokyo exchange's first section, with 2.04 billion shares changing hands, below last week's daily average of 2.46 billion. Advancing stocks beat declining ones, 867 to 750.
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