TOKYO, March 26 (Reuters) - Japanese shares jumped on Friday, led by a bounce back in tech shares, on bargain hunting after a sharp retreat in the benchmark index Nikkei this week, while overnight Wall Street gains on economic recovery hopes also supported the sentiment.
Nikkei share average advanced 1.1% to 29,046.55 by 0156 GMT, while the broader Topix gained 1.13% to 1,977.89.
“This is a reaction from a sharp fall this week, which was caused by no fundamental reasons,” said Takashi Hiroki, chief strategist at Monex Securities.
“Investors have been selling stocks to rebalance their portfolios toward the end of the fiscal year ending March and that weighed on the indexes, but that is almost over at the end of the month.”
Japanese shares were also supported by overnight gains on the Wall Street, buoyed by renewed optimism for economic recovery after U.S. President Joe Biden pledged to double his Administration’s vaccination rollout plan.
Tech start-up investor SoftBank Group rose 1.73% and was the top contributer to Nikkei, while chip-related shares Tokyo Electron and Advantest jumped 1.7% and 3.29%, respetively.
Toyota Motor and Sony were the biggest contributors to the Topix index, rising 2.46% and 2.05%, respectively.
All the 33 sector sub-indexes on the Tokyo exchange traded higher, with materials and transport sectors leading gains.
Top 30 core Topix gainers were Daiichi Sankyo, up 2.59 %, followed by Hoya.
Top underperformers among the Topix 30 were Keyence and Murata Manufacturing losing 1.34% and 0.36%, respectively.
There were 206 advancers on the Nikkei index against 17 decliners.
(Reporting by Junko Fujita; Editing by Rashmi Aich)
Source: Reuters