Asia: Stocks jump ahead of ECB announcement

Asian stocks rose on Thursday on optimism that the European Central Bank (ECB) will deliver major fresh monetary stimulus to the struggling Eurozone economy.

The ECB is expected to announce a QE programme that may exceed €1trn.

A weaker yen helped the Japanese Nikkei-225 to edge higher by 0.28%. The yen weakened against the dollar to 118.17.

In the last day of the Bank of Japan’s monetary policy meeting, the central bank revised up its forecast for factory output, while remaining optimistic about private consumption.

On Wednesday, the monetary authority decided to maintain its target for the annual rate of expansion in the country's monetary base at ¥80trn.

Governor Haruhiko Kuroda said: "Looking at wage negotiations and inflation expectations, fortunately there is no concern of Japan being beset by a deflationary mindset again."

"If Japan is making steady progress towards achieving 2 per cent inflation, there's no need to take additional steps," he continued.

Shanghai Index rose 0.59% as the People’s Bank of China injected $8bn worth of short-term loans into the country’s financial system in order to bolster economic growth.

This week’s data from China revealed the country saw the slowest economic growth in 24 years despite better-than-expected gross domestic product of 7.3% year-on-year in the fourth quarter. Forecasts expected a 7.2% growth.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was also higher by 0.7%.

Despite disappointing consumer and housing data, Australia’s ASX rose 0.49%.

New home sales Down Under dropped in November by 2.2% month-on-month after a 3% drop in October. In parallel consumer's inflation expectations decreased to 3.2% in January from 3.4% in December.