Japan CBI, Bank of Japan

Amazon Web Services has announced 2.26 trillion yen ($15.24 billion) investment To meet the growing customer demand for cloud services in Japan by 2027.

Tadao Nagasaki, president of AWS Japan, said the investment will be in existing cloud infrastructure in Tokyo and Osaka. A Linkedin post.

Nagasaki wrote that the investment would benefit “multiple verticals” that contribute to Japanese industries in the public and government sectors.

“It will help more Japanese companies to access and adopt new, emerging and transformative digital technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning,” he added.

– Lim Hui Jee

Morgan Stanley says the Bank of Japan does not see an exit from its negative interest rate regime at the central bank's policy meeting next week.

“As for the January monetary policy meeting, I think it will be scrapped [of negative interest rates] It's off the table right now because of the earthquake,” Takeshi Yamaguchi, Morgan Stanley's chief Japan economist, told CNBC's “Street Science Asia.”

“Wage negotiations will be very strong this year. Last year, the headline increase was around 3.6% but 3.7% [this year] We expect closer to 4% in terms of headline wage growth,” Yamaguchi said, adding that he believes this will be key to the BOJ ending its negative interest rate policy.

The BOJ is set to release its monetary policy decision on Tuesday, with markets widely expecting the central bank to stick with its current stance.

Friday's data also showed Japan's core inflation The rate fell to 2.6% in December, its lowest level since June 2022. It was also 2.8% in November.

– Shreyashi Sanyal

Japan's inflation is increasingly being driven by wages rather than input costs, which Schroders says will be positive for the country's stocks and its economy.

Masaki Taketsume, fund manager at Schroders, told CNBC's “Squawk Box Asia” that the country's inflation rate eased to 2.6% in December from 2.8% in November, a result of lower input costs.

However, spring wage negotiations, or “Shundo”, in March are expected to bring “a positive effect” in terms of wage increases, leading to a moderate increase in inflation to 3% in the second half, he said. year.

“[This will be] Led by wage growth, that's what the Bank of Japan expects,” Taeksum said.

– Lim Hui Jee

Japan's core inflation The rate fell to 2.6% in December from 2.8% in November and hit the lowest level since June 2022.

Japan's core inflation rate – which strips out fresh food prices – fell to 2.3% from November's figure of 2.5%, in line with the expectations of economists polled by Reuters.

The so-called “core-core” inflation rate, which strips out fresh food and energy prices and is closely watched by the Bank of Japan, was 3.7%, slightly lower than the 3.8% seen in November.

– Lim Hui Jee

Chipmakers Advanced Micro Devices and Nvidia were among several other S&P 500 names that hit 52-week highs on Thursday. AMD traded at highs not seen since the company's IPO in September 1972, while Nvidia shares were at levels not seen since January 1999. Other tech and software companies, industry names and a couple of hotel chains also hit new highs.

Here are some of the names that hit the all-time high:

Stocks in the broader market index that hit new 52-week lows included Devon Energy, ExxonMobil and Humana.

– Pia Singh, Christopher Hayes

According to AllianceBernstein, many sectors – and stocks – in the Asia Pacific are looking “particularly attractive right now”.

These stocks are “highly ranked in terms of size and among our companies that our Bernstein analysts have a strong positive view of,” wrote analysts at the Wall Street bank, which named them among its Asian “Top Picks for the Next Six Months.”

CNBC Pro subscribers can read more here.

– Amala Balakrishna

Oil prices rose on Thursday due to solid demand growth forecasts for 2024 and a large US crude inventory withdrawal.

West Texas Intermediate futures rose $1.52. or 2.09%, settling at $74.08 per barrel. Brent futures for March delivery rose $1.22, or 1.57%, to settle at $79.10 a barrel.

The International Energy Agency predicts that crude demand will increase by 1.2 million barrels per day in 2024, while OPEC put the figure at 1.8 million barrels.

The U.S. drew 2.5 million barrels from its crude inventory in the week ended Jan. 12, more than expected.

– Spencer Kimball

Apple shares rose more than 1% in premarket trading after an upgrade from tech giant Bank of America. The bank also said that there is an improvement of more than 20%.

“We upgrade Apple to Buy from Neutral, given: 1) a strong multi-year iPhone upgrade cycle driven by demand for the latest hardware to enable generative AI features introduced in 2024/2025 (still the bulk of the installed base on the iPhone 11), 2) Apple better monetizing its installed base in services More growth,” BofA said.

Initial jobless claims fell sharply last week in a surprise move, signaling ongoing tightening in the labor market.

Initial jobless filings for the week ended Jan. 13 were 187,000, a decline of 16,000 from the previous period and below the Dow Jones estimate of 208,000, the Labor Department reported Thursday.

Continuous claims, which trail a week earlier, fell to 1.806 million, a decline of 26,000 and below the FactSet estimate of 1.83 million.

– Jeff Cox