Major Asian markets traded higher on Thursday, following the stronger lead seen on Wall Street. Investors in the region will also keep an eye on Caixin’s China services and composite PMI later in the morning after the Caixin manufacturing PMI beat estimates and the country’s official PMI met expectations.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 popped at the open, jumping 2.04 percent as markets there opened for their first day of trade after a long New Year weekend. Most sectors were in positive territory, with financials, technology and automakers higher across the board. Toyota rose 2.07 percent and Honda climbed 2.12 percent. Heavyweight SoftBank Group rose 3.12 percent.

Meanwhile, the Kospi tacked on 0.24 percent as most tech names traded higher in the early going, likely supported by the sector gaining during the U.S. session. Samsung Electronics rose 0.62 percent and SK Hynix jumped 1.93 percent.

Shipbuilders, which had rallied in the new year due to optimism in the outlook for the sector, extended gains. Hyundai Heavy Industries was 3.42 percent higher and Daewoo Shipbuilding gained 0.58 percent.

In Sydney, the S&P/ASX 200 rose 0.25 percent, with the energy sub-index among the top-performers in the morning after oil prices touched their highest levels in two and a half years overnight. Oil and gas producers mostly notched gains, with Santos up 0.28 percent and Oil Search rising 1.93 percent.

U.S. stocks closed higher in the last session, with the S&P 500 closing above 2,700 for the first time as technology stocks notched more gains. Semiconductor names led the sector higher, with AMD jumping 5.19 percent and Nvidia soaring 6.58 percent on the day.

The Dow Jones industrial average advanced 0.4 percent, or 98.67 points, to close at 24,922.68 and the S&P 500 gained 0.64 percent to finish at 2,713.06.

On the data front, manufacturing activity stateside topped expectations, with the ISM manufacturing index for December released Wednesday coming in at 59.7.

Investors also digested minutes from the Federal Reserve’s meeting in December, which showed that most members thought upcoming changes in taxes would lead to higher real GDP growth. The minutes also showed members of the Federal Open Market Committee were somewhat at odds over meeting the central bank’s inflation target of 2 percent.

Elsewhere, European markets ended higher as new financial sector rules under Mifid ll came into effect, with the pan-European Stoxxx 600 closing nearly 0.5 percent higher.

The dollar firmed in the last session after six straight session of declines on the back of optimistic releases stateside. The dollar index, which tracks the U.S. currency against a basket of six peers, traded at 92.162 at 8:08 a.m. HK/SIN, after falling to a more than three-month low earlier this week.

The greenback also edged higher against the yen to fetch 112.68, after beginning the week at the 112.3 handle.

Oil prices extended gains after touching their highest levels in two and a half years on Wednesday on the back of a wider market rally. The move higher in prices also came as protests continued in Iran, although analysts said those were unlikely to negatively impact oil production in the country.

U.S. West Texas Intermediate advanced 0.31 percent to trade at $61.82 per barrel after rising 2.1 percent in the last session. Brent crude futures, which had yet to trade, rose 1.9 percent to settle at $67.84 on Wednesday.

Dalian Wanda Commercial Property was downgraded from “BBB” to “BB+” by Fitch Ratings on Wednesday, a two-notch downward revision. Fitch said the downgrade reflected the company’s “inability to access offshore funding channels to boost its offshore liquidity in a timely manner.”

Here’s the economic calendar for Thursday (all times in HK/SIN):

• 8:30 a.m.: Japan Nikkei manufacturing PMI
• 8:30 a.m.: Singapore Nikkei PMI
• 9:45 a.m.: China Caixin services and composite PMI