Tokyo stocks higher after Wall Street gains

Tokyo - Tokyo stocks opened higher on Tuesday, backed by gains on Wall Street and the yen's downwards trend.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 index rose 0.70% or 154.50 points to 22 206.68 in early trade while the broader Topix index was up 0.69% or 11.74 points at 1 723.53.

"Japanese stocks will test higher prices with sentiment buoyed by rises in US stocks and the yen's downtrend," Okasan Online Securities chief strategist Yoshihiro Ito said in a client note.

Wall Street stocks rose solidly for a third straight session on Monday, with beaten-down banking shares gaining as investors again brushed aside trade war worries.

The dollar was trading at ¥110.96 against ¥110.82 in New York on Monday afternoon.

Investors were focussing on economic fundamentals in the absence of fresh news on US trade frictions with China.

"I want to underscore that you cannot conclude now that the global economy will lose steam as the trade war escalates," said Masayuki Kubota, chief strategist at Rakuten Securities.

• READ:Asian markets mixed but trade war fears fester 

"There are some issues that deserve buying among stocks in the semiconductor or automobile industry or those related to China that had faced too much selling," he said in a client note.

In individual stocks trade, SoftBank Group jumped 2.55% to ¥8 797 after it announced its filing with the Tokyo bourse for the listing of its mobile unit, aiming to raise more than $20bn.

Nissan rallied 2.19% to ¥1 025.5 after plunging more than 4% on Monday after saying it would make a statement on exhaust measurement issues.

After the market closed, the automaker admitted that data on exhaust emissions and fuel economy had been deliberately "altered".

But the alterations affected fewer than 1 200 cars, the automaker said.

Toyota was up 0.16% at ¥7 222 while Sony gained 0.82% to ¥5 739.