World Shares Mostly Climb, Oil Slips   07/10 04:46

   World shares mostly advanced Friday, helped by buying of technology-related 
shares, while oil prices slipped as traders watched for developments in the 
Iran war.

   HONG KONG (AP) -- World shares mostly advanced Friday, helped by buying of 
technology-related shares, while oil prices slipped as traders watched for 
developments in the Iran war.

   Tensions between Iran and the U.S. have escalated after President Donald 
Trump said the Iran war ceasefire agreement was "over" and as the United States 
and Iran exchanged attacks.

   In early European trading, Britain's FTSE 100 edged up 0.1% to 10,478.98. 
France's CAC 40 slipped 0.1% to 8,322.31, while Germany's DAX also gave up 0.1% 
to 25,082.58.

   The future for the S&P 500 edged 0.1% lower while that for the Dow Jones 
Industrial Average gained 0.1%.

   In Asian trading, South Korea's Kospi gained 2.5% to 7,475.94, recovering 
some of its losses from earlier in the week. Shares in memory chipmaker SK 
Hynix, whose debut on the Nasdaq in New York is set for Friday, fell 0.3% in 
Seoul.

   Tokyo's Nikkei 225 rose 1.2% to 68,557.73. SoftBank Group, a key investor in 
OpenAI, jumped 10.7%, while chip equipment maker Tokyo Electron added 2.7%.

   Hong Kong's Hang Seng gained 0.6% to 24,175.12 and the Shanghai Composite 
index fell 1% to 3,996.16.

   Australia's S&P/ASX 200 gained 0.5% to 8,806.00.

   India's Sensex added 1.2%.

   Oil prices yo-yoed again on Friday as global oil supplies remained under 
pressure due to a limited numbers of vessels able to cross the Strait of 
Hormuz, a crucial waterway for energy transport.

   Brent crude, the international standard, fell 0.5% to $75.94 per barrel. It 
was trading near $72 a barrel before the war began in late February.

   Benchmark U.S. crude shed 0.5% to $71.71 a barrel.

   On Thursday, Wall Street's benchmark S&P 500 index rose 0.8% and the Dow 
picked up 0.3%. The technology-heavy Nasdaq composite climbed 1.3% to 26,206.89.

   Semiconductors stocks led gains. Micron Technology jumped 4.5% after the 
memory chipmaker said it would increase its U.S. investments, citing "surging 
demand for memory in the AI era."

   Shares of AMD, or Advanced Micro Devices, surged 5.7%. Marvell Technology 
rose 5%, while ON Semiconductor added 4.4%.

   In other dealings early Friday, the U.S. dollar fell to 161.71 Japanese yen 
from 162.37 yen. The euro was trading at $1.1432, up from $1.1430.

   The yen gained against the dollar after Finance Minister Satsuki Katayama 
told a parliamentary committee that the government plans to encourage big 
pension funds to invest more in domestic, yen-denominated assets.