Asian stocks surge after Trump says Iran war settlement is near

Asian markets rallied sharply on Wednesday morning after President Donald Trump said an understanding had been reached to end the war in Iran and that an agreement would be signed in the coming days. The optimism also pushed oil lower, while metals extended gains.

Japan's Nikkei rose 3.4%, South Korea's Kospi jumped 7.8%, triggering a brief trading halt during the session, Hong Kong's Hang Seng gained 1.9%, and Shanghai advanced 1.4%. In Seoul, Samsung climbed 11% and SK Hynix added 8.2%. In Tokyo's semiconductor sector, Lasertec rose 10.8%, Tokyo Electron surged 10%, and Advantest gained 9.5%.

Mining stocks led the Nikkei, with Mitsui Mining up 18.4% and Sumitomo Metal Mining up 11.8%. On the Kospi, Hanmi Semiconductor soared 26.5% after announcing it was buying 50 million SpaceX shares for a total of $32.9 billion. After last night's offering, SpaceX is set to begin trading on Nasdaq this evening under the ticker SPCX.

SpaceX raised $75 billion in the offering at $135 per share, implying a valuation of $1.77 trillion. In commodities, Brent crude fell 1.9% to $88.6 a barrel and WTI slipped 1.9% to $86.1 a barrel. Gold rose 2.1% to $4,200 an ounce and silver climbed 4.4% to $66.8 an ounce.