By Ambar Warrick

-- Asian stock markets rose on Thursday, tracking overnight gains in Wall Street as investors awaited more cues on U.S. monetary policy, while focus turned to interim earnings from some of the biggest firms in China.

Chinese stocks rose slightly, ahead of interim earnings from oil refiners CNOOC Ltd (SS:600938), PetroChina Co Ltd (SS:601857), and China Petroleum & Chemical Corp (SS:600028) - some of the largest companies in the country. Shares of the three rose between 1% and 3.5%. China Life Insurance (SS:601628), one of the country’s largest insurers, rose 2.1% ahead of its interim earnings report.

China’s blue-chip Shanghai Shenzhen CSI 300 index rose 0.1%, while the Shanghai Composite index added 0.3%. Investors will be waiting to see the impact of COVID-19 lockdowns through the first half of the year on corporate earnings. Several real estate developers in China have already reported much weaker results for the period.

Hong Kong’s technology-heavy Hang Seng index rose the most in Asia on Thursday, surging 1.4% in afternoon trade.

The Stock Exchange of Hong Kong delayed the market open on Thursday due to extreme weather conditions stemming from typhoon Ma-on. But the storm now appears to be moving away from the city.

Broader Asian stock markets also rose, with Japan’s Nikkei 225 index adding 0.7%, while the Taiwan Weighted Index rose 1%.

Regional stock markets took a positive lead-in from Wall Street indexes, which rose on positive earnings and gains in energy stocks.

But most global stock markets kept to a tight range this week, ahead of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell’s address to the Jackson Hole Symposium on Friday.

Powell is widely expected to reiterate the bank’s hawkish stance, which may cause further volatility in stock markets. Several Fed officials said in recent weeks that the bank is likely to maintain its pace of sharp interest rate hikes to combat inflation reaching 40-year highs.

A majority of traders also expect the Fed to maintain its momentum of 75 basis point rate hikes in September.