Asian markets advance on Monday (MarketWatch) (19-05-2008)

HONG KONG (MarketWatch) - Energy, steel and resource shares boosted Asia Pacific stock markets on Monday, with markets in India, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand closed for public holidays.

Tokyo's Nikkei 225 ended 0.4% higher, rising 50 points to 14,269.61 and the Topix index added 0.6%, or 8 points, to 1,404.25.

Markets in Shanghai and Shenzhen halted trading for three minutes at 2:28 p.m. (2:28 a.m. Eastern) session as part of national mourning for the victims of the earthquake that struck Sichuan province last Monday.

Sydney's ASX 200 climbed 0.3%, Taiwan's Weighted index added 1.1%, Indonesia's JSX Composite firmed 0.9%, and New Zealand's NZX-50 climbed 0.1%.

Hong Kong's Hang Seng climbed 0.7% t0 25,803.65 while a sub-index of China-incorporated shares, the Hang Seng China Enterprises Index, added 1.3% to 14,370.15.

Among markets trading in weaker territory, South Korea's Kospi shed 0.2% and Shanghai's Composite index retreated 0.4%.

Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group, Japan's third-largest bank by assets, saw its shares climb 0.8% after the group reported net income of $4.41 billion for the year ended March 31. The bank also reported 93 billion yen in losses from write-downs and sales of subprime-related assets.

In currencies, the U.S. dollar was changing hands at 104.15 yen, compared with 104.01 yen in late North American trading Friday.

Crude oil for June delivery climbed as much as 33 cents to $126.62 a barrel in electronic trading in late-morning Tokyo hours. The contract settled at $126.29 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange Friday, advancing $2.17 a barrel, or 1.7%.

  SourceMarketWatch