Investing.com - Asian equities rose in morning trade on Friday, with overnight gains in European and U.S. equities cited as supportive. U.S. President Donald Trump confirmed on Thursday that tariffs on $34 billion worth of Chinese goods would kick-in at 12:01AM ET (04:01 GMT) on Friday morning.
Overnight, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.7%, the S&P 500 0.9% and the Nasdaq Composite 1.1%.
Trump told reporters that another $16 billion are expected to go into effect in two weeks, and that he is considering to impose additional tariffs on $500 billion in Chinese goods if Beijing retaliate.
First “34, and then you have another 16 in two weeks and then as you know we have 200 billion in abeyance and then after the 200 billion we have 300 billion in abeyance. Ok? So we have 50 plus 200 plus almost 300," Trump said.
“It’s only on China," he added.
The Shanghai Composite and the Shenzhen Component climbed 0.2% and 0.3% by 9:45PM ET (01:45 GMT). Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index also edged up 0.1%.
A editorial piece in state-owned newspaper China Daily raised some eyebrows as it accused the U.S. of “blackmail” and “racketeering”. The newspaper said "its unruliness looks set to have a profoundly damaging impact on the global economic landscape in the coming decades, unless countries stand together to oppose it."
"While the objective of the Donald Trump administration's protectionism is to reverse the relative economic decline of the US and benefit selected domestic industries and workers in the US, it will not achieve those aims," the paper wrote. "Instead, the effect will be rising prices in the US, which in turn will affect the balance sheets of many US companies operating in China, since they account for a large proportion of China's exports to the US."
Chinese officials have said earlier that it would retaliate against Trump’s tariffs on Chinese goods.
"China will not bow down in the face of threats and blackmail and will not falter from its determination to defend free trade and the multilateral system,” Chinese Commerce Ministry spokesman Gao Feng said on Thursday.
South Korea’s KOSPI slipped 0.1%. Index heavyweight Samsung Electronics (KS:005930) received some focus as a regulatory filing revealed that its Q2 profit likely rose 5.2% from a year earlier.
April-June profit was likely 14.8 trillion won, the company said, adding that it would disclose detailed earnings in late July.
Elsewhere, Japan’s Nikkei 225 rose 0.8%, and Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 traded 0.4% higher in morning trade.