SYDNEY, June 26 (Reuters) - Japanese shares bounced back on Friday, tracking overnight Wall Street gains, with banks leading the rally in both markets, after U.S. banking regulators' decision to relax some rules allayed fears over a spike in new coronavirus cases.
The benchmark Nikkei average .N225 rose 1.0% to 22,474.65 by the midday break. For the week, it was nearly flat so far.
Wall Street's main indexes closed higher on Thursday, with bank stocks soaring after U.S. banking regulators unveiled new rules that will make life easier for large banks with complex trading and investment portfolios. It helped to offset investor jitters over alarming increases in new coronavirus cases. .N on the positive wave, shares in Tokyo-listed banks also gained, with Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG) Inc 8306.T , Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group (SMFG) Inc 8316.T and Mizuho Financial Group Inc 8411.T rising between 1.6% and 1.9%.
The benchmark Nikkei's heavyweight SoftBank Group Corp 9984.T advanced 3.5% as the tech conglomerate said after the market close on Thursday that it would buy back up to 5.75% of own shares worth 500 billion yen ($4.7 billion) through March 31, 2021. broader Topix .TOPX rose 0.8% to 1,573.57 by the midday recess, with all but six of the 33 sector sub-indexes on the Tokyo exchange trading higher.
Financial-related securities .ISECU.T , banking .IBNKS.T and insurance .IINSU.T were among the top performing sector subindexes on the main bourse.
Bucking the overall gaining trend, the index of Mothers start-up shares .MTHR fell 1.1%, after touching its highest level since Oct. 2, 2018 earlier in the session. ($1 = 107.1700 yen)