Asian markets were mixed with the Shanghai Composite up sharply.

The Nikkei rose a fraction to 17,226. Hitachi rose 1.8% to 742. NTT rose 2.8% to 586000.

Softbank fell 1.7% to 2315. Sony rose .2% to 5100.

Toyota rose 3.6% to 8200

The Hang Seng fell .2% to 19,965. China Netcom fell 3% to 20.85. China Unicom fell 8.4% to 11.4. HSBC fell .1% to 142.6.

Th KOSPI was closed.

The Straits Times rose rose .8% to 2,986.

The Shanghai Composite was up 4.2% to 2,675.

Data from Reuters.

Douglas A. McIntyre