Japanese shares track Wall Street gains, China worries cap rise

TOKYO, April 26 (Reuters) – Japanese shares ended higher on Tuesday, tracking Wall Street gains overnight, but concerns over the impact of China’s COVID-19 lockdown on domestic companies capped their rise.

The Nikkei share average gained 0.41% to close at 26,700.11. The broader Topix rose 0.11% to 1,878.51, after briefly entering negative territory earlier in the session.

Shanghai’s COVID-19 lockdown misery dragged into a fourth week, while orders for mass testing in Beijing’s biggest district sparked fears that the Chinese capital could be destined for a similar fate.

“Investors were cautious about the impact of possible China’s economic slowdown on Japanese companies, as now there is a possibility that Beijing could be locked down,” said Tomoichiro Kubota, senior market analyst at Matsui Securities.

“Today’s market rose thanks to the gains on Wall Street and falling U.S. Treasury yields.”

Technology investor SoftBank Group provided the biggest boost to the Nikkei, rising 4.13%, followed by medical services platform M3, which jumped 5.04%. Chip-testing equipment maker Advantest rose 2.28%.

Fujitsu rose 2.17% after a report said the computer maker was weighing a sale of it scanning business to office equipment maker Ricoh, which fell 1.08%.

Canon Marketing Japan jumped 7.00% after the sales arm of camera maker Canon raised its profit outlook.

Sumitomo Metal Mining tumbled 6.83%, and was the biggest loser on the Nikkei, after the miner and smelter said it would discontinue a long-running feasibility study on a nickel processing plant project in Pomalaa, Indonesia.

The volume of shares traded on the Tokyo Stock Exchange’s main board was 1.08 billion, compared to the past 30-day average of 1.22 billion.

(Reporting by Junko Fujita; Editing by Vinay Dwivedi)