Asia: Stocks jump across the region

Asian equities finished the session with almost across-the-board gains on Friday, ahead of a long-weekend in the UK and in the US.

Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe was unable to convince his fellow G7 leaders to include a reference to the need to avoid another financial crisis in the post-summit statement.

However, according to some analysts the venue may have afforded him the necessary political cover to announce that the consumption tax hike scheduled to come into effect in April 2017 will be postponed.

Multiple reports overnight, first reported by Kyodo News, indicated the announcement could come as soon as early next week.

"Insofar as Japan is the most indebted nation in the world, it would have been convenient to have the cover of an international expansion of fiscal spending for Abe to deliver another round of stimulus at home. There is still speculation that this will happen around this summer’s Upper House elections.

There are plenty of reports this morning that Abe will delay to next planned hike in the sales tax for another 2 years," Jane Foley, senior FX analyst at Rabobank said in a research note sent to clients.

Against that backdrop, the Nikkei-225 ended the day 0.37% higher at 16,834.84.

To take not of as well, at Thursday´s G7 summit the European Union and Japan announced they would accelerate negotiations to build a free trade area, targeting an agreement for before the end of 2016.

Significantly, the G7 communique struck a compromise between the positions of Japan´s guests and itself on the subject of direct FX interventions, "underscoring the importance of all countries refraining from competitive devaluation” but also “[reiterating] that excess volatility and disorderly movements in exchange rates can have adverse implications for economic and financial stability,” Foley said.

Maritime disputes in the region with the People´s Republic of China were also broached by the assembled leaders.

The Shanghai Stock Exchange´s Composite Index drifted lower by 0.05% to 2,821.05.

Hong Kong´s Hang Seng was up by 0.88% to 20,576.77 by the close of trading.

All the other major equity indices in the region were also sporting gains by the end of the session, ranging from Bombay´s S&P 100 BSE Index gain of 1.17% to an 0.41% advance for Vietnam´s HNX Index.

The US dollar spot index was edging slightly higher in morning trading, tacking on 0.16% to 95.32.