Japan shares higher at close of trade; Nikkei 225 up 1.93%

Investing.com – Japan equities were higher at the close on Wednesday, as gains in the Chemical, Petroleum & Plastic , Transportation Equipment and Paper & Pulp sectors propelled shares higher.

At the close in Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 rose 1.93%.

The biggest gainers of the session on the Nikkei 225 were Ebara Corp. (TYO: 6361 ), which rose 5.84% or 320.00 points to trade at 5,800.00 at the close. Rakuten Inc (TYO: 4755 ) added 5.83% or 36.00 points to end at 654.00 and TDK Corp (TYO: 6762 ) was up 4.59% or 205.00 points to 4,670.00 in late trade.

Biggest losers included Mitsubishi Estate Co Ltd (TYO: 8802 ), which lost 0.69% or 11.00 points to trade at 1,575.00 in late trade. Olympus Corp. (TYO: 7733 ) declined 0.35% or 8.00 points to end at 2,267.50 and Mitsui Fudosan Co., Ltd. (TYO: 8801 ) shed 0.35% or 8.50 points to 2,396.00.

Advancing stocks outnumbered falling ones by 3160 to 496 and 172 ended unchanged on the Tokyo Stock Exchange.

The Nikkei Volatility , which measures the implied volatility of Nikkei 225 options, was up 17.22% to 22.80 a new 3-month high.

In commodities trading, Crude oil for May delivery was down 1.02% or 0.71 to $68.96 a barrel. Meanwhile, Brent oil for delivery in May fell 0.92% or 0.69 to hit $74.63 a barrel, while the April Gold Futures contract fell 0.06% or 1.15 to trade at $1,939.95 a troy ounce.

USD/JPY was down 0.02% to 132.46, while EUR/JPY fell 0.07% to 142.57.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.03% at 102.87.