Japanese stocks rallied strongly today as Asian equities also gained on the back of better-than-expected China trade balance data for March, but also as US futures kept higher after a softer performance by Wall Street in overnight trading.

The Hang Seng is up by 0.8% while the Shanghai Composite is up by 1.3% currently.

In the currencies space, this is keeping the aussie and kiwi slightly more underpinned with AUD/USD keeping above 0.6400. Meanwhile, the dollar remains softer across the board still.