Japan stocks up more than 3%, Asia markets gain after Wall Street's rally

Investors should not get into the chip space yet, said chairman of Kirkland Capital, Kirk Yang, explaining that he is cautious of Taiwan and the global semiconductor landscape.

Yang said the chip sector now faces a demand-side problem due to higher interest rates, the U.S. imposing restrictions on exports to China, as well as inventory corrections.

"Unfortunately, we'll continue to see negative data points for [the] next several quarters," Yang projected.

"Probably a better time to get into semiconductor stocks sometime in the first half of next year."

— Lee Ying Shan

With the Federal Reserve expected to undertake more aggressive interest rate hikes, unemployment in the U.S. will rise higher than forecast, RBC Capital Markets chief U.S. economist Tom Porcelli says.

Porcelli expects three more 75 basis-point hikes and predicts the Fed will get to a terminal rate of 4.75%.

"But I do not believe that, you know, putting three additional 75 basis point hikes in the system is going to sort of quell near term inflationary dynamics," he said on CNBC's Squawk Box Asia on Friday.

"What it will do is raise the unemployment rate meaningfully higher than what they're forecasting for next year, which is to say, 4.4%," he said. "There's no way you will have a 4.4% unemployment rate with a Fed that aggressive."

At 4.75%, unemployment would be at 5% which equates to about 2 million job losses, Porcelli adds. The current U.S. unemployment rate is 3.5%.

— Su-Lin Tan

"Bear markets are no fun. But we do know that every bear market is eventually followed by a bull market and the trick is not to let the market volatility scare you out of stocks," Nancy Tengler, CEO and chief investment officer of Laffer Tengler Investments, said.

She believes investors should seize the opportunity to put money in the "highest quality names" amid the current market weakness, naming four stocks she likes.

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— Zavier Ong

Shares of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company jumped as much as 5.31% after its earnings topped estimates, with third-quarter net profits surging almost 80% from a year ago.

The Apple supplier's net income rose to 280.9 billion new Taiwan dollars ($8.81 billion) for the July-September quarter – compared with 156.26 billion new Taiwan dollars for the same period in 2021.

TSMC's stock was last up 4.94%.

– Jihye Lee

The Japanese yen fell to a 32-year low against the dollar overnight and hovered around 147-levels in Asia's morning.

The yen touched 147.67 per dollar after the U.S. inflation report came in hotter than expected, reaching weakest levels since August 1990. It last traded at 147.30 against the greenback.

Meanwhile, the Australian dollar strengthened to $0.6329 after falling to $0.6169 following the U.S. CPI data release.

"AUD quickly recovered its losses, helped by reports that the UK government would change part of its proposed fiscal policy," Kim Mundy, a currency strategist at Commonwealth Bank of Australia, wrote in a note.

— Abigail Ng

The Monetary Authority of Singapore tightened its monetary policy in a widely expected move as inflation pressures weigh on the economy.

The central bank said it will re-center the mid-point of its exchange rate policy band known as the Singapore dollar Nominal Effective Exchange Rate. The MAS left the slope and width of the policy band unchanged.

Singapore controls policy through its exchange rate rather than interest rates. It manages the strength or weakness of the Singapore dollar against its main trading partners. Inflation stood at 7.5% in August.

Read the story here.

— Abigail Ng

China's September consumer price index grew annually at 2.8%, the fastest pace since April 2020, pushed higher by food costs. Food prices rose by 8.8% annually.

The nation's CPI rose by 0.3% in September from August, missing estimates of 0.4% in a Reuters poll.

The producer price index for the month grew 0.9% compared to a year ago, also missing expectations of 1% that economists surveyed by Reuters predicted.

— Jihye Lee

Singapore's gross domestic product grew 4.4% in the third quarter from the same period last year, according to advance estimates released by the government, much higher than 3.4% predicted by analysts in a Reuters poll, and in line with growth in the second quarter.

GDP in the third quarter also expanded 1.5% from the previous quarter on a seasonally adjusted basis, meaning Singapore avoided a technical recession. Second-quarter GDP contracted 0.2% from the first quarter. 

The Ministry of Trade and Industry in August narrowed Singapore's GDP forecast for 2022 to 3% to 4%, compared to an earlier 3% to 5%.

Read more here.

— Abigail Ng

The S&P 500 has lost 25% of its value so far this year, but could still fall by "another easy 20%," JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon predicted on Monday.

Its sharp decline is a familiar story around the world, as investors flee stocks. But one "surprising" index is bucking the trend and beating the S&P 500 this year.

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— Zavier Ong

Stocks closed higher Thursday after staging a major reversal in intraday trading.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 827 points, or 2.83%, to close at 30,038.06 after being down more than 500 points earlier in the day.

The S&P 500 ticked up 2.60% to 3,669.87, breaking a six-day losing streak. The Nasdaq Composite gained 2.23% to end the day at 10,649.15.

—Carmen Reinicke