Stock market today: Asian shares power higher following slight gains on Wall Street

BANGKOK (AP) — Asian shares powered higher on Thursday, with Chinese benchmarks up more than 1%, after Wall Street logged modest gains in this holiday-shortened week. U.S. futures edged higher and oil prices were mixed. Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index was an outlier in the region, shedding 0.5% to 33,519.61. Speculation over whether and when the Bank of Japan might ease its longstanding lax monetary policy and raise its key interest rate from minus 0.1% has kept stocks wobbling in the world’s third-largest economy. BOJ policymakers are waiting to see what sort of wage gains might come in 2024 as part of the central bank’s strategy of keeping credit easy to try to spur stronger growth. In Hong Kong, the Hang…