Asia equities mixed on the day as rising yields, trade worries push traders around

Asia equities are following Wall Street stocks' lead and are softer on the day for Thursday, though Japan's Nikkei index is playing higher, trading above 22,850.00.

US 10-year Treasury yields hit 3.1%, a seven-year high, and equities are recoiling slightly at the prospect of rising financing costs. The Shanghai Composite is down around 0.25% on the day so far, while the Hang Seng trades mostly flat near 0.05%. China-related stock indexes are down for the day as poor trade relations between the US and China continue to roll over, and China has removed holds on fruit and pork tariffs on American products.

Japan's equities are trading better on the day with the Nikkei 225 index up over 0.65% for Thursday, unperturbed for now by the US-China trade spat.

Nikkei 225 levels to watch

Japan's leading index has lifted strongly from March's low of 20,318.00, but the index is still down on the year, sitting at -5.7% from January's high of 24,186.00. The challenge for Nikkei bulls will be to keep the momentum going long enough to clear the next hurdle in resistance at the 23,000.00 major handle, a level that constrained prices last December. A bearish turnaround from here to could easily fall to 21,500.00 and hit the 50.0 Fibo retracement level, assuming support from the 200-day SMA at 21,700.00 fails to hold.