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Asian stocks rise after China GDP beats estimate

Asian stock markets traded higher late Tuesday, with sentiment supported by China's fourth quarter gross domestic product which beat expectations to come in at 7.3 percent from the year-ago period. This was a tick higher than the 7.2 percent forecast by analysts and holding steady from the prior quarter.

In other news, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) trimmed its global growth forecast for 2015-16, cautioning that the boost from lower crude oil prices would be offset by dimmer economic prospects for China, Russia, the euro area, Japan and oil producers.

U.S. markets were closed for the Martin Luther King Jr. Day on Monday.

Mainland indices up

China's benchmark Shanghai Composite index rose nearly 2 percent, after flitting between positive and negative in volatile intraday trade, following a slightly better-than-expected growth report card. In the previous session, the key stock index slumped 7.7 percent – its biggest daily percentage drop in over six years – to a three-and-a-half-week low on the back of declines in property developers. A crackdown on margin lending also led to losses in the financial sector.

Brokerages continued the downtrend on Tuesday over concerns related to the regulatory moves, with Citic Securities and Haitong Securities leading declines with a 9.8 and 8.7 percent plunge, respectively. Founder Securities also receded 4.2 percent.

"1 trillion of outstanding margin financing isn't a small amount so definitely, there will be a pop. Stocks like Haitong and Citic dropped by 10 percent yesterday, but in Hong Kong, there was 10-15 percent fall, so A-shares will catch up to H-shares today by dropping further," Dickie Wong, executive director at Kingston Securities, told CNBC.

Among top gainers, train makers CSR and China CNR rose by the maximum allowable 10 percent each. Property majors also recouped Monday's losses; China Merchants Property and Poly Real Estate each jumped over 3 percent.

Meanwhile, Hong Kong's Hang Seng index settled 0.9 percent higher.

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