Jan. 18 （Bloomberg） -- Asian stocks rose, led by technology companies on speculation that prices for dynamic random-access memory chips will increase. Steelmakers fell on concern their earnings will disappoint.
Elpida Memory Inc. led shares of computer-memory chipmakers higher after the Nikkei newspaper said the Japanese company plans to raise prices. Aluminum Corporation of China, the nation’s largest maker of the metal, jumped 6.9 percent in Hong Kong after saying it will return to profit. Nippon Steel Corp. and JFE Holdings Inc., two of Japan’s biggest steelmakers, fell at least 1.4 percent in Tokyo after the Nikkei said the companies may miss their earnings forecasts.
“The direction is still up in terms of an improvement in the global economy,” said Tim Schroeders, who helps manage $1 billion at Pengana Capital Ltd. in Melbourne. “It’s just a question of how much valuations have been priced in. There are problems the global economy will have to overcome through 2011, and investors are rebalancing their thoughts as some of these issues come to the fore.”
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index advanced 0.6 percent to 139.31 as of 1:38 p.m. in Tokyo, as European finance ministers pledged to boost the safety net for the region’s debt-strapped countries. About three stocks rose for each that fell on the index, which last week climbed to a 2 1/2-year high after German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she was ready to take necessary steps to stem Europe’s sovereign debt crisis.
Jobs Health Leave
Japan’s Nikkei 225 Stock Average gained 0.3 percent. South Korea’s Kospi Index added 0.5 percent and Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 Index climbed 0.8 percent. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index advanced 0.8 percent. Exchanges in the U.S. were closed for Martin Luther King Jr. Day yesterday, while the Stoxx Europe 600 Index rose 0.1 percent to 284.06.
Futures on the U.S. Standard & Poor’s 500 Index fell 0.2 percent and those on the Nasdaq 100 Index dropped 0.9 percent from the Jan. 14 close after Apple Chief Executive Officer Steve Jobs was granted a medical leave of absence as his health deteriorates from battling a rare form of cancer and the effects of a liver transplant, according to a person with knowledge of the situation. Apple accounts for 21 percent of the Nasdaq 100 gauge by weight.
Apple, along with Citigroup Inc. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc., are among companies scheduled to release earnings this week. Analysts estimate that S&P 500 profits grew 22 percent in the final three months of 2010 and will increase 14 percent in 2011, according to data compiled by Bloomberg News.
Apple Earnings
Apple earnings are forecast to have grown 47 percent to $5.39 a share in the fourth quarter, according to a survey of analysts.
Jobs’s sick leave “won’t have a big impact on the industry,” said Yoshinori Nagano, a senior strategist in Tokyo at Daiwa Asset Management Co., which oversees about $104 billion. “So, related share moves will be temporary.”
Elpida rose 3.1 percent to 1,121 yen in Tokyo. The company plans to raise prices of dynamic random access memory chips 10 percent as early as this month, the Nikkei reported today, without citing anyone. Elpida spokesman Hiroshi Tsuboi declined to comment on the report.
Since chipmakers last raised prices of the benchmark DRAM chip in May, prices have tumbled 63 percent amid a glut, according to data compiled by TrendForce Corp.’s Dramexchange in Taiwan.
DRAM Chips
Samsung Electronics Co. and Hynix Semiconductor Inc., the world’s two largest makers of the chips, climbed in Seoul trading. Samsung gained 3.3 percent to 980,000 won and Hynix rose 4.1 percent to 28,000 won.
“Prices of DRAM chips appear to have reached a bottom,” Sam Hsieh, a Taipei-based fund manager at Fuh Hwa Investment Trust Co., who helps oversee the equivalent of $7.8 billion. “Coupled with the report about Elpida raising prices, investors are more optimistic about the companies and want to buy more now.”
Aluminum Corp. of China, also known as Chalco, jumped 6.9 percent to HK$7.61 in Hong Kong after saying it expects to report a profit for 2010, compared with a loss a year earlier, on higher prices and sales volumes. The stock had the biggest gain on the Asian benchmark gauge.
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index rose 14.3 percent last year, compared with an advance of 12.8 percent by the S&P 500 and 8.6 percent by the Stoxx Europe 600 Index.
Steelmakers
Among stocks that fell today, Nippon Steel sank 1.4 percent to 293 yen in Tokyo, and JFE dropped 1.5 percent to 2,784 yen. The companies may fall short of their earnings forecasts for the year through March 31 because of increasing material costs, the Nikkei said, without saying where it obtained the information.
Nippon Steel may report a pretax profit of 220 billion yen （$2.7 billion）, missing its own estimate by 30 billion yen, the newspaper reported. JFE will probably post a pretax profit of 200 billion yen, lower than an expected 220 billion yen.
In Sydney, BlueScope Steel Ltd., Australia’s biggest steelmaker, sank 1.8 percent to A$2.16.
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