TOKYO, Aug. 10 (Xinhua) -- Tokyo stocks finished slightly higher on Tuesday since strong U.S. jobs data for July and positive financial performances from Japanese companies enhanced market sentiment.

The 225-issue Nikkei Stock Average closed 68.11 points, or 0.24 percent, higher from Friday at 27,888.15.

The broader Topix index of all First Section issues on the Tokyo Stock Exchange ended 6.94 points, or 0.36 percent, higher at 1,936.28.

Trading volume on the main section increased to 1,087.59 million shares from Friday's 991.69 million shares.

Due to upbeat quarterly earnings by Japanese firms, stocks rose in general, and the Nikkei index briefly went over the 28,000 mark for the first time in two weeks. However, the upward momentum became weak in the afternoon amid a lack of new trading cues.

Koichi Fujishiro, a senior economist at the Dai-ichi Life Research Institute, said, "Positive U.S. jobs data pushed the market up in the morning, but investors became cautious as the benchmark hit the 28,000 threshold and they moved to lock in profits."

The U.S. Labor Department said on Friday that the U.S had added 943,000 jobs in July, surpassing the market consensus of 870,000, and the country's unemployment rate decreased to 5.4 percent, 0.5 percentage point lower from June.

In addition to profit-taking measures, uncertainties over a global economic recovery amid a surge in infections of the Delta variant also stressed the Tokyo market, he added.

By the close of play, air transportation, pharmaceutical, and land transportation shares headed the upward trend. Gainers outnumbered declining ones 1,311 to 790 on the First Section, while 88 finished unchanged.

Mitsui Mining and Smelting surged 8.8 percent after the nonferrous metal supplier on Friday disclosed about the upward revision of its earnings estimate for the business year through March, which lifted its net profit outlook by 68.2 percent from the previous forecast in May.

In contrast with the market trend, gaming-related firms performed weakly throughout the day. Among them, Bandai Namco Holdings dropped 3.9 percent, Sony Group sank fell 2.5 percent, and Nintendo ended down 3.1 percent. Enditem

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