Nissan Honda merger, Singapore CPI in focus

Asia-Pacific markets started the holiday-shortened Christmas week on a positive note, after a U.S. government shutdown was averted over the weekend.

On Monday, investors will be looking out for any official announcement related to the merger of Japanese automakers Honda Motor and Nissan Motor. Japanese media outlet Jiji Press has reported that the announcement could come as early as Monday.

This comes after Nissan shares saw a record surge last Wednesday, following a media report that the struggling Japanese automaker was looking to merge with Honda.

Japan’s Nikkei 225 climbed 0.68%, while the Topix was 0.51% higher.

South Korea’s Kospi gained 0.72%, and the small-cap Kosdaq rose 0.96%.

Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 started the day up 0.71%.

Futures for Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index stood at 19,886, pointing to a stronger open compared to the HSI’s close of 19,720.7.

Last Friday in the U.S., all three major indexes climbed, helped by cooler-than-expected inflation data.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 1.18%, while the S&P 500 added 1.09% and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite advanced 1.03%.

The personal consumption expenditures price index, the Fed’s preferred inflation gauge, accelerated to 2.4% in November from 2.3% the previous month, but was still lower than the 2.5% estimate from Dow Jones.

Excluding food and energy, core PCE rose 2.8% from a year ago, slightly below expectations of 2.9%.

— CNBC’s Brian Evans, Sean Conlon and Jeff Cox contributed to this report.