Hong Kong: China on Friday hiked the yuan against the dollar in its biggest one-day increase since 2005, after the greenback fell against leading currencies the previous day.
Markets in Asia were largely flat after a day of little change in Europe and on Wall Street, but Samsung shares were boosted as it tipped soaring profits while Toyota dipped following a threat from Donald Trump over a new vehicle plant in Mexico.
The 0.92 percent hike was the strongest daily increase since July 2005, and comes after the yuan recently flirted with the 7.0 to the dollar mark, a threshold not crossed in more than eight years.
C3,501 yen. Meanwhile Samsung rose almost two percent on news that it expects profits to soar by nearly 50 percent in the December quarter, as strong memory chip prices push earnings to their highest point in three years despite a smartphone recall fiasco.
Brisk sales of memory chips and smartphone screens had been expected to boost the company's bottom line but the outcome exceeded analyst expectations.
Tokyo was slightly down overall as the yen strength weighed on sentiment and following declines on Wall Street.
The US currency was trading at 115.85 yen in afternoon trade, up from its earlier low of 115.07 yen, but sharply down from 118.12 yen seen on Wednesday.
A stronger yen hurts the profitability of Japan's major exporters, hitting demand for their shares.
Shanghai stocks also closed down less than half a percent, dragged lower by a sell-off
