Tokyo's Nikkei share average climbed 0.9 percent to a more than six-year high on Thursday, with buying mostly by retail investors as tax-free investment accounts aimed at driving Japanese savings into stocks kicked off.
The Nikkei was up 145.99 points at 16,155.98 in mid-morning trade, after closing above 16,000 for the first time since December 2007 on Wednesday.
"Today's the first day of the NISA trading start, so retail investors are quite active, or at least investment trusts will be quite active because they will be handling the money from The government-sponsored investment plan, known as Nippon Individual Savings Account, will provide a five-year tax holiday on dividends and capital gains provided the money is invested in stocks, mutual funds or exchange traded funds.
Also underscoring the positive short-term outlook, Japanese companies' one-month earning momentum improved to 4.3 percent from -0.65 last month, data from Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S showed. That compared with -4.19 percent for the Standard & Poor's 500.
