Global markets: Asian stocks climb five-month high on US President Donald Trump's announcement on tariff deadline

The Asian stocks scaled five-month peak on account of US President Donald Trump's decision to push out the tariff deadline. The US President confirmed that he would delay a planned increase on Chinese imports as talks between the two sides were making 'substantial progress.'

The Australian dollar, a liquid proxy for China investments, got a 0.4 per cent lift from the news and the dollar touched a fresh seven-month low on the yuan.

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Shanghai blue chips jumped 2.8 per cent. That brought gains this year to 20 per cent, helped in part by Beijing's efforts to pump new credit into the financial system.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside added 0.5 per cent to the highest since October, and is up 10 percent for the year so far.

Japan's Nikkei climbed 0.6 percent to levels last seen in mid-December. E-Mini futures for the S&P 500 ESc1 edged up 0.3 percent, while Treasury futures TYc1 slipped.

On Friday, the US markets had gained on the fast-approaching March 1 US-China trade talks. Nasdaq had gained 0.91 per cent while the Dow Jones gained around 0.7 per cent. 

Trump on Sunday tweeted he would push back the March 1 deadline for higher tariffs and looked forward to a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping when a deal was sealed. and Chinese negotiators were discussing the thorny issue of how to enforce a potential trade deal on Sunday after moving ahead on structural issues, a source said.

Trump tweeted progress had been made on intellectual property, technology transfers, agriculture, services and currencies. high frequency engagement between Beijing and Washington at a senior level implies that both sides are looking for some form of settlement," said Tai Hui, chief market strategist Asia Pacific at J.P. Morgan Asset Management.

"I think the market has been moving towards this view in recent weeks, as shown by the strong performance in China A Shares and Asian equities. Hence, the latest news may not offer a significant boost."