SINGAPORE —Stocks in Asia-Pacific rose in Wednesday morning trade as investor sentiment continued to be buoyed by a recent positive development on the coronavirus vaccine front.

In Japan, the Nikkei 225 rose 1.26% in early trade as shares of robot maker Fanuc jumped 2.25%. The Topix index also gained 1.58%. South Korea’s Kospi added 0.39%.

Shares in Australia rose, with the S&P/ASX 200 up 1.14%.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan traded 0.19% higher.

Tech shares in the region slipped after their counterparts on Wall Street saw declines overnight.

In Japan, shares of conglomerate Softbank Group slipped 2.34%. Over in South Korea, tech company Kakao saw its stock decline 1.4%.

Hong Kong-listed shares of Chinese tech giants Alibaba and Tencent will also be watched on Wednesday. That comes after China’s State Administration for Market Regulation on Tuesday announced a set of draft guidelines aimed at curbing monopolistic behavior on internet platforms.

Investor focus will likely remain on the coronavirus situation, following a positive announcement on Monday by Pfizer and BioNTech regarding a potential vaccine. Still, the number of cases globally continued to rise rapidly.

“A rotation theme remains evident in equity markets,” Rodrigo Catril, a currency strategist at National Australia Bank, wrote in a note. The recent vaccine development from Pfizer and BioNTech has “triggered a reassessment of the outlook for next year,” he said.

“Big tech which has benefited from our virus driven change in behaviour (working from home a primary example) is now falling out of favour while small cap stocks and those that have been most affected by social distancing restrictions have outperformed,” Catril said.

Overnight on Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 262.95 points to close at 29,420.92. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite, on the other hand, saw losses on the day.  The S&P 500 slipped 0.1% to 3,545.53 while the Nasdaq slid 1.4% to 11,553.86.

The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of its peers, was at 92.749 after rising from levels below 92.4 earlier this week.

The Japanese yen traded at 105.23 per dollar, still off levels below 104.3 against the greenback seen earlier in the week. The Australian dollar changed hands at $0.728, higher than levels below $0.72 seen last week.