Asia shares mostly gained after Wall Street wobbled over strong jobs report

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HONG KONG (AP) — Asia shares were mostly higher Thursday and benchmarks in Japan and South Korea reached new records after Wall Street wobbled following a better-than-expected U.S. job report.

U.S. futures edged higher.

Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 surpassed the 58,000 mark early in the session as trading resumed after a holiday. By midday, it was up 0.2% at 57,748.81.

Japanese shares have rallied following Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s landslide victory in a parliamentary election on Sunday, as investors expect more policies to help spur economic growth.

South Korea’s Kospi breached the 5,500 mark during Thursday, driven by gains for technology-related stocks. It was up 2.5% at 5,485.71.

Samsung Electronics, South Korea’s biggest listed company, rose 5.9%. Chipmaker SK Hynix was up 3.3%.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 0.9% to 27,024.06. The Shanghai Composite index edged 0.1% higher, to 4,137.06.

In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 traded 0.3% higher at 9,037.60.

On Wednesday, the S&P 500 was flat after initially moving toward an all-time high, closing 0.34 points lower, at 6,941.47. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.1% to 50,121.40. The Nasdaq composite dropped 0.2% to 23,066.47.

A U.S. Labor Department report said U.S. employers added 130,000 jobs to their payrolls in January, way more than economists had forecast.

The blockbuster U.S. non-farm payrolls report “strengthens the case for higher U.S. Treasury yields and a rebound in the dollar over the coming months,” Jonas Goltermann, deputy chief markets economist at Capital Economics wrote in a note.

The latest job report reflects that the U.S. labor market is stabilizing, he said, so the chance of another Fed rate cut over the next few months is “quite low.”

In the U.S. stock market, Robinhood Markets, the trading and investment app, lost 8.8% as investors focused on a slowdown in crypto trading that has weighed on the company. Bitcoin’s price in recent days has fallen to roughly half of its record high set in October.

Moderna fell 3.5%, after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration refused to review its application for a new flu vaccine. Kraft Heinz was up 0.4%, as the company said it was pausing plans to split into two businesses.

Shares of companies in the raw-material and energy sectors saw some of the bigger gains. Exxon Mobil rose 2.6%, while Smurfit Westrock surged 9.9%.

In other dealings early Thursday, U.S. benchmark crude oil gained 40 cents to $65.03 a barrel. Brent crude, the international standard, rose 38 cents to $69.78 per barrel.

Gold and silver prices fell on Thursday. The price of gold was down 0.4% to 5,079.30 per ounce, and the price of silver was down 0.6% to $83.42 an ounce.

The U.S. dollar fell to 152.77 Japanese yen from 153.27 yen. The euro was trading at $1.1862, down from $1.1873.

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AP Business Writer Stan Choe contributed.