Investing.com - Asian shares gained on Wednesday, reflecting gains on Wall Street overnight and bargain hunting by investors in Japan.
The Nikkei 225 rose 1.9%, even as the dollar was roughly unchanged. Japanese stocks have had an especially rough run lately, falling over 10% from a late September peak and seesawing earlier this week. On Tuesday, it lost 2%.
Earlier, data showed that Japanese exports rose 6.9% from a year earlier in September, helped by the yen's descent and a surge in output among suppliers of Apple Inc.'s new smartphones.
Still, the nation's trade deficit still edged up 1.6% to ¥958.3 billion from a year earlier, the first increase in three months.
Elsewhere, Australia's S&P/ASX 200 was up 0.8% and Korea's Kospi was up 0.5%.
Overnight, U.S. stocks surged after a flurry of upbeat third-quarter earnings sparked a Wall Street rally.
The Dow 30 rose 1.31%, the S&P 500 index rose 1.96%, while the Nasdaq Composite index rose 2.40%.
The National Association of Realtors reported earlier that existing home sales increased 2.4% to 5.17 million units in September from 5.05 million in August.
Analysts had expected existing home sales to rise 1% to 5.10 million units in September, and the better-than-expected figure boosted stock prices.
On Wednesday, the U.S. is to produce data on consumer prices.