A block of industrial factories stands among newer apartment buildings along a canal in Tokyo, Japan.
Photo by Michael Russell | Moment | Getty Images
Asia-Pacific markets opened higher on Wednesday after US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell noted progress in taming inflation as investors awaited a flurry of data from the region.
Traders in Asia will assess June activity figures from India and China, due later today.
The au Jibun Bank reported that Japan's composite purchasing managers' index fell to 49.7 in June, down sharply from 52.6 a month earlier, indicating a decline in Japanese private sector activity for the first time in seven months.
The bank noted that a slight decline in the services sector, the first drop since August 2022, outweighed a marginal increase in manufacturing output for the month.
Japanese Nikkei 225 rose 0.84%, remaining above the 40,000 mark, while the broad-based Topix rose 0.08%.
South Korea's Cospi started the morning up 0.26%, while the Kosdaq Index rose 0.5%.
Australia's S&P/ASX 200 opened 0.25% higher in early trading.
Hong-Kong Hang Seng Index futures were at 17,764, lower than the HSI's last closing price of 17,769.14.
In the US, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.41% overnight, the S&P 500 rose by 0.62% and the Nasdaq Composite jumped 0.84%. Both the Nasdaq and the S&P 500 reached record highs.
Shares of Tesla led the S&P 500 higher after Elon Musk's electric car company beat expected second-quarter deliveries.
—CNBC's Pia Singh and Sarah Min contributed to this report.
