Australian shares touch 7-Year high

Australian shares reaped big gains (+0.8%) Monday in Asia to reach a seven-year high riding on China's rate trim.
MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan rose 0.1 percent. Tokyo's Nikkei crawled up 0.3 percent and Chinese and South Korean stocks also posted comparable modest gains.
The weekend easing only had a limited effect on the region's overall markets with the dollar reaching a five-week high against the euro.
The Aussie dollar climbed to $0.7850 early in the session before impact from the China rate cut faded and was last trading at $0.7771, down 0.5%.
US dollar was up 0.1% at 119.87 yen after rising to a three-week high of 119.955. It gained about 0.6% last week when upbeat US data helped revive prospects of an early interest rate increase by the Federal Reserve.