Asian stocks were mostly higher yesterday on hopes for good earnings reports from top technology companies, while the dollar held near its recent lows ahead of US retail sales figures expected to point to a weak economy.
Tokyo's Nikkei stock average, reopening after a holiday on Monday, closed the morning up 0.83 per cent at 8,540.92 after falling for four sessions.
Top mobile phone operator NTT DoCoMo jumped five per cent on news of increased market share.
"The subscriber numbers on Friday looked very positive for DoCoMo. For the first time in a couple of months they captured 55 per cent market share," said Bruce Kirk, equity research director at KBC Securities.
A flat performance from US stocks offered little immediate direction for Asian shares and the dollar. The Dow Jones Industrial Average barely moved and the Nasdaq Composite Index dipped just 0.1 per cent.
But one encouraging sign for the US reporting season came from Rambus Inc, which climbed in after-hours trading on Monday after it posted higher revenues. Rambus develops technology that raises the performance of computer memory chips.
The dollar was steady as uncertainty over whether the US would attack Iraq seemed set to continue. Dealers said they were hoping to determine some direction for the market from US retail sales data for December out at 1330 GMT.
Few expected the data to be encouraging for the dollar after weak employment numbers last week pointed to a soft US economy.
The dollar was little changed around its late New York levels of 118.95 yen and $1.0536 to the euro, near a three-year low of $1.0585 hit on Friday.
Hong Kong stocks fell 0.3 per cent, while Taiwan rose to fresh five-month highs, standing up 0.6 per cent by late morning.
But South Korean shares dropped as concerns over the North Korean nuclear crisis persisted. The Korea Composite Stock Price Index was down 0.9 per cent at 642.16 by late morning.
Samsung Electronics, the world's largest memory chip maker, shed 2.2 per cent ahead of its fourth-quarter earnings report tomorrow.
Other markets were mostly higher, with benchmarks up one percent in Malaysia, 0.3 per cent in Australia and 0.2 per cent in Singapore
US oil futures fell on profit-taking following a rally in New York on concerns about tight supplies. February crude fell 31 cents to $31.95 per barrel after settling up 58 cents on Monday. The fall in crude pulled inflation-sensitive gold lower, to around $353.70 an ounce from $354 at the US close.