Upwards on Asian Stock Exchanges

It mostly pointed upwards on leading Asian stock exchanges in the initial Thursday trading.

In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 index was up 0.6 percent around lunch local time, while the broader Topix index stood at plus 0.4 percent.

In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng simultaneously pointed to plus 0.2 percent.

The composite indexes in Shanghai and Shenzhen were up 1 and 0.8 percent, respectively.

South Korea broke the pattern, where the Kospi index was down 0.6 percent.