Asian stocks rose, following a rebound in U.S. shares, as the yen’s first drop in seven days buoyed Japanese exporters. Materials and health-care shares led gains.

The MSCI Asia Pacific Index added 0.2 percent to 152.57 as of 9:01 a.m. in Tokyo. The measure retreated 0.9 percent yesterday, the most in almost a month, as China’s curbs on speculative trading outweighed the central bank’s biggest cut to reserve requirements since 2008. Chinese equity futures pointed to a rebound Tuesday, with contracts on the Hang Seng China Enterprises Index of mainland shares in Hong Kong rising 0.9 percent.

“The Chinese authorities in the short term are trying to soften the blow,” Stephen Wood, chief market strategist at Russell Investments in New York, told Bloomberg TV. “Japan is something we’ve been looking at for a while now. You’re probably seeing Europe being the most attractive and secondarily the U.S. tied with Japan right now” among global equity markets.

Japan’s Topix index gained 0.4 percent after the yen weakened 0.2 percent Monday. South Korea’s Kospi index added 0.3 percent. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 Index and New Zealand’s NZX 50 Index added 0.2 percent.

The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index advanced 0.9 percent yesterday, rebounding from the worst slide in three weeks as IBM Corp. led a rally in technology shares. E-mini futures on the equity gauge climbed 0.1 percent on Tuesday.

Federal Reserve Bank of New York President William C. Dudley said he’s relatively optimistic a growth rebound will warrant raising interest rates in 2015, though he’s “not reasonably confident right now” inflation will climb. Fed policy makers last month were split over whether they would raise rates in June or later, a debate that occurred before disappointing payroll figures for March, minutes of their most recent policy meeting showed.

Canon Inc. slid 0.9 percent in Tokyo after the Nikkei newspaper reported the camera maker will post a drop in profit in the three months through March.

(Source: Bloomberg)