Asia close: Hang Seng tops 2007 highs

Equities in the Asia Pacific region raced ahead on Wednesday, led by gains in Hong Kong's benchmark Hang Seng index, which topped its pre-crisis highs.

In a boost to sentiment, overnight Japanese finance minister Taro Aso warned traders that "big moves" in exchange rates could be problematic, although the yen's then current level against the US dollar was not.

While a seeming statement of the obvious, traders interpreted the former as a verbal intervention or an attempt by Aso to at least dampen recent volatility.

The Nikkei leapt 1.0% higher in response, tacking on 236.93 points to close at 23,951.81, as dollar/yen was boosted back to 111.0.

Nonetheless, Hong Kong's Hang Seng was the star of the session, surging forward by 1.81% or 565.88 points to 31,904.75, breaching its previous record closing level set in October 2007, although it fell short of the intraday high of 31,958.41.

That came alongside gains on the Shanghai Stock Exchange's Composite Index of 0.77% or 26.11 points to 3,436.59, while South Korea's Kospi added 0.72% or 18.01 points to 2,521.74.

To take note of, China's yuan also found a bid on the back of Aso's remarks, hitting an intraday high of 6.4440 against the greenback.

Down Under on the other hand, Sydney's All Ordinaries gave back 0.35% to see the session out from 6,165.95.

India's Sensex was also lower, losing 0.21% to 34,771.05 after Reserve Bank of India deputy gvernor Viral Acharya told a group of traders they should not rely on the monetary authority to manage their interest rate risk.

His remarks pushed the yield on the benchmark 10-year Indian sovereign bond up by 10 basis points to 7.38%, weighing on the share prices of local lenders due to their elevated holdings of government debt.

Elsewhere, China's Commerce Ministry reported that in 2016 the country's non-financial overseas investments slumped 29.4% to $120bn, as Beijing clamped down on capital outflows.

Also on the economic front, according to the Bank of Japan the rate of gains in the country's corporate goods index slipped from 3.6% for November to 3.1% in December (consensus: 3.2%).

On a stronger note, the Ministry of Economics's index of tertiary industry activity (services) jumped by 1.1% month-on-month in November (consensus: 0.3%).