Asia markets rise as Japan keeps monetary policy unchanged, yen weakens

Japanese conglomerate Sony posted a record annual operating profit of 1.21 trillion yen ($8.96 billion) for its financial year ended March. The results were driven by its chip division and sales of its flagship PlayStation 5 gaming console, which hit a record for the financial year.

Net profit for the year stood at 943.62 billion, 6.21% higher compared with the previous financial year, while revenue came in at 11.54 trillion versus the previous year's 9.92 trillion.

Sony previously forecast operating profit of 1.18 trillion yen and 11.5 trillion yen in revenue for its full financial year.

For the three months ended March, revenue was at 3.06 trillion yen, a 35% year-on-year rise, while operating profit fell 7% to 128.46 billion yen.

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— Lim Hui Jie, Arjun Kharpal

Singapore's commercial properties may pique investor interest as they are not subject to additional buyer's stamp duties, said Henry Chin of CBRE.

CBRE is "very positive" about offices, retail stores, hotels and especially shophouses, Chin told CNBC's "Squawk Box Asia."

While the mass residential market will likely remain resilient and stable, Chin said Singapore's newly raised property taxes will have a "profound impact" on speculative luxury residential investments. Stamp duties for foreign buyers of residential properties doubled from 30% to 60% starting Thursday.

"For 2023, we think residential transaction value is going to be down by 10%," he added.

In Hong Kong, commercial real estate is looking "increasingly attractive" for new investors as rents have declined, said Chin. But he said Singapore is still "a safer choice" for risk-averse investors as it provides a steady income flow.

— Audrey Wan

The Bank of Japan left its interest rates unchanged in newly appointed Governor Kazuo Ueda's first policy meeting.

The decision was in line with economist expectations for no changes to the benchmark interest rate, which has been held at minus 0.1% since the central bank took rates below zero in 2016.

The Japanese yen weakened further to 134.6 against the U.S. dollar and the yield on the 10-year Japanese government bonds was at 0.460%.

Ueda has earlier this week emphasized inflation needs to be "quite strong and close to 2%" — the central bank's target — before making any adjustments to the yield curve control policy.

— Jihye Lee

Top Chinese chipmaker SMIC won't be able to produce cutting-edge chips without acccess to high-tech machines, analysts told CNBC.

SMIC, or Semiconductor Manufacturing International Co., has not been able to obtain extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography machines — which are crucial to produce advanced chips on a large scale at lower costs.

EUV machines are only able to be made by a single firm in the world, namely, Dutch firm ASML.

"It's just not commercially profitable for SMIC to make those chips with less advanced equipment," said Phelix Lee, equity analyst for Morningstar Asia.

Dutch regulations specified that ASML will need to apply for a license to export its EUV machines. ASML has not shipped these advanced machines to China so far.

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— Sheila Chiang

Prices of private homes in Singapore increased by 3.3% in the first quarter of 2023, a faster pace than the 0.4% increase recorded in the previous quarter.

Singapore's Urban Redevelopment Authority revealed that prices of landed properties increased by 5.9%, while prices for non landed properties climbed 2.6% in the first quarter of 2023.

This is compared with a 0.6% increase for landed properties, as well as a 0.3% increase recorded for non-landed properties in the previous quarter.

Separately, rentals climbed by 7.2%, slightly lower compared to the 7.4% increase in the previous quarter.

This comes on the back of surprise cooling measures enacted by Singapore late on Wednesday, which saw the country raise taxes for property purchases, amid concerns that surging prices "could run ahead of economic fundamentals."

— Lim Hui Jie

Bank of Japan officials have started planning a "broad policy review" including discussions of a change to its forward guidance, Nikkei reported.

The report added while the talks ,include deferring a decision on YCC tweaks, there is a possibility of a follow-through taking around a year after the review.

Nikkei also reported that the central bank is heading toward amending guidance to remove reference to monitoring Covid effects and will discuss dropping the language about its readiness to ease further if necessary.

— Jihye Lee

Japanese carrier All Nippon Airways posted a full year net profit of 89.5 billion yen ($668 million) for its 2022 financial year ended March, its first full year profit since 2020.

This was a reversal from the 143.6 billion yen loss in the previous financial year, and higher than 2019's net profit of 28 billion yen.

Operating profit for came in at 120 billion yen, compared to the previous year's operating loss of 173.1 billion yen. Revenue stood at 1.7 trillion yen, a 67% spike year-on-year.

In a release, ANA said the airline industry was "improving rapidly," adding both domestic and international flights were benefiting from easing Covid-19 related restrictions.

— Lim Hui Jie

The pharma stock behind a popular weight-loss drug is up 137% since the treatment was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Barclays investment bank expects the stock to rise further as the market for obesity treatment drugs could be more than $100 billion, according to Barclays.

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— Ganesh Rao

Chip stocks have rebounded this year after performing poorly in 2022.

The PHLX Semiconductor Sector Index is up nearly 17% in the year to date, making this sector one of the brightest spots in the market turmoil.

CNBC Pro takes a look at semiconductor stocks that the banks are giving further upside to.

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— Weizhen Tan

Japan's unemployment rate rose to 2.8% in March, from 2.6% in February, government data showed.

The reading was higher than Reuters' forecasts of 2.5% and marks the highest reading since January 2022. The nation's jobs-to-applicant ratio was at 1.32, below Reuters' forecasts of 1.34.

Meanwhile, industrial production in March rose 0.8% month-on-month after a 4.6% rise in the previous month. This exceeds Reuters' forecasts of a 0.5% increase for the month.

Year-on-year, the reading fell 0.8% in March after a decline of 1.4% in February.

March's reading was driven by autos, semiconductor and flat panel making equipment while declines were seen in memory chips and active LCD panels.

— Jihye Lee

South Korea's industrial output has come in at a 7.6% decline year on year, a smaller fall compared to economists expectations of a 10.1% drop.

This is also the second straight month that industrial output has risen, following a 13.4% decline in January and 8% fall in February.

On a month on month basis, industrial output climbed 5.1%, a reversal from the 2.7% drop in February.

— Lim Hui Jie

The consumer price index in Japan's capital city ticked higher and rose 3.5% in April, government data showed on Friday.

The reading exceeded forecasts in a Reuters poll expecting to see a 3.2% increase for the month, after posting a slightly cooler inflation reading of 3.2% in March.

Excluding fresh food, Tokyo's consumer price index rose 3.5% — also above the central bank's inflation target of 2%.

The Japanese yen stood at 133.83 against the U.S. dollar shortly after the release. The yield on the 10-year Japanese Government Bonds stood at 0.476%, nearing the upper ceiling of the central bank's tolerance range of 50 basis points above and below 0%.

— Jihye Lee

The U.S. economy expanded by 1.1% in the first quarter, a much-slower-than-expected pace, the Commerce Department said. Economists had forecast expansion of 2%, per Dow Jones. The report showed stronger inflation with prices increasing 4%, compared with an estimate of 3.7%.

— Jeff Cox

Communication services stocks are on pace for their best day since Feb. 2, with the sector last up about 5.8%. Meta drove gains in the sector after posting first-quarter results that beat analysts' expectations. The tech stock was last up more than 15%.

— Sarah Min

Shares of beleaguered regional bank First Republic were climbing on Thursday, giving the stock a reprieve after two days of heavy selling.

The stock rose 71 cents, or about 12%, but is still trading below $7 per share.

First Republic's stock closed at $16 per share on Monday before the bank released its first quarter results, which showed that deposits shrank by about 40% in the first three months of the year.

First Republic and its advisors are trying convince other banks to buy some of its assets at above market rates to allow First Republic to reshape its balance sheet, CNBC reported Wednesday.

— Jesse Pound

Facebook parent company Meta's better than expected quarterly results has spurred further analyst optimism.

Firms including Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup all updated price targets for the stock.

"Developing more open source models (including LLMs) and helping create an open ecosystem is another area of focus as an open ecosystem should enable META to stay at the forefront and drive infrastructure efficiency over time," Morgan Stanley's Brian Nowak wrote on Thursday.

Meta beat Wall Street estimates on both adjusted earnings per share and revenue on Wednesday, despite concerns over slower ad sales. The stock gained as much as 12% after the results.

"Meta earnings show the company's commitment to cost discipline while driving accelerating N-T revenue growth and also continuing to invest in longer-term transformational technologies like AI and the metaverse," JPMorgan analyst Doug Anmuth said.

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— Brian Evans