Overnight, European stocks bounced around while US equities shook off early weakness to push higher as investors waited to see if a so-called Santa Claus rally would materialise.

US "stocks didn't really have any direction in the morning, then we got this tech rally that just sort of drifted higher all day," said Steve Sosnick of Interactive Brokers.

Analysts said that could help boost semiconductor-related shares, including in Tokyo, although the key Nikkei index was down 0.3 percent at the break.

Hong Kong was up 0.9 percent and Shanghai gained 0.5 percent. Taipei rose 0.8 percent and Wellington was up 0.7 percent, but Seoul declined 0.2 percent.

Hang Seng Bank said in a note that Hong Kong stocks were "consolidating before the long holiday".

It was among several exchanges, including Sydney, closing early on Tuesday.

"This is the time of the year when there's a lot of noise and little to no signal in price action," said Kyle Rodda, senior market analyst at Capital.Com cited by Bloomberg News.

"There's a high chance of a pretty slow day for the region and an uneventful rest of the week as a high proportion of the markets log off for the holidays."

Despite the gains, Asian stocks faced downward pressure "as the Bank of Japan warned against foreign exchange speculation and Australia cut its iron ore price forecast, negatively impacting Japanese and Australian markets", Hang Seng Bank added.

Honda shares soared 16 percent after the Japanese auto giant announced a buyback of up to 1.1 trillion yen ($7 billion), as it enters merger talks with struggling rival Nissan.

The talks on collaboration between Honda and Nissan would create the world's third-largest automaker, expanding development of EVs and self-driving tech.

Honda's CEO insisted it was not a bailout for Nissan, which announced thousands of job cuts last month and reported a 93 percent plunge in first-half net profit.

- Key figures around 0200 GMT -

Tokyo - Nikkei 225: DOWN 0.3 percent at 39,043.95

Hong Kong - Hang Seng Index: UP 0.9 percent at 20,062.57

Shanghai - Composite: UP 0.5 percent at 3,369.54

Euro/dollar: UP at $1.0438 from $1.0431 on Monday

Pound/dollar: UP at $1.2581 from $1.2567

Dollar/yen: UP at 156.47 yen from 156.45 yen

Euro/pound: DOWN at 82.95 pence from 82.98 pence

West Texas Intermediate: UP 0.5 percent at $69.59 per barrel

Brent North Sea Crude: UP 0.5 percent at $73.01 per barrel

New York - Dow: UP 0.2 percent at 42,906.95 (close)

London - FTSE 100: UP 0.2 percent at 8,102.72 (close)

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