Mainland and Hong Kong shares had mixed trades in opening on Thursday in spite of the S&P 500 rising to a fresh record hours earlier behind a surge in Oracle shares.

In Hong Kong, the benchmark Hang Seng Index shed 212 points, or 0.81 percent, to fall back to 25,987 in opening trades.

The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index opened down 0.16 percent at 3,806, while the Shenzhen Component Index was 0.11 percent higher at 12,570.

The ChiNext Index, tracking China's Nasdaq-style board of growth enterprises, was up 0.46 percent to open at 2,917.

In Japan, the Nikkei share average climbed to a record high, led by Softbank Group, which tracked its US peers higher on optimism over the growth of AI-driven cloud businesses.

The Nikkei rose 0.8 percent to 44,198 mid-morning after touching a record high of 44,251 earlier in the day.

The broader Topix was flat at 3,149.

"SoftBank Group boosted the Nikkei, benefiting from expectations that the cloud businesses would continue to grow following a surge in shares in Oracle," said Yugo Tsuboi, chief strategist at Daiwa Securities.

Oracle soared 36 percent overnight, marking its biggest one-day percentage gain since 1992, after the tech company pointed to a demand surge from AI firms for its cloud services, helping the S&P 500 and Nasdaq notch record-high closes on Wednesday.

Technology investor SoftBank Group jumped 9 percent, while chip-testing equipment maker Advantest rose 3.54 percent. (Reuters/Xinhua)