The Seoul skyline.
Mongkol Chuewong | Moment | Getty Images
South Korea’s Kospi index jumped more than 3% Thursday to hit an all-time high, lifted by gains in heavyweight Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix.
Shares in Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix, which announced a partnership with OpenAI late Wednesday to supply memory chips, rose over 4% and 11%, respectively.
Meanwhile, the Kosdaq rose 0.95%.
South Korea’s consumer price index climbed 2.1% year on year in September, more than the 2% rise expected by economists in a Reuters poll. The latest reading compares with the 1.7% growth in August.
Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 index advanced 0.6%, while the Topix fell 0.54%.
Australia’s ASX/S&P 200 surged 1.14%.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index advanced 1.30%. Shares of Zijin Gold skyrocketed nearly 12%, building on gains for two consecutive days since its Hong Kong trading debut Tuesday. The Hang Seng Tech index climbed 2.08%.
Chinese and Indian markets were closed for holidays.
U.S. equity futures were little changed in early Asian hours after the S&P 500 recorded a fresh high Wednesday stateside, as traders bet that the U.S. government shutdown would be short-lived.
The shutdown is expected to last at least three days, with the Senate set to be out of session Thursday stateside due to Yom Kippur, but traders are betting that the shutdown could drag on for nearly two weeks.
Overnight, the broad market index gained 0.34% to close at 6,711.20. Earlier, it had hit a new all-time intraday high. The Nasdaq Composite rose 0.42% to settle at 22,755.16, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average traded up 43.21 points, or 0.09%, to finish at 46,441.10.
— CNBC’s Pia Singh and Sean Conlon contributed to this report.