By Roushni Nair

Aug 5 (Reuters) - Asian equities rose on Tuesday, led by South Korea and Taiwan stocks, as investors piled into riskier regional assets on hopes the U.S. Federal Reserve will ease monetary policy after last week's dismal jobs report.

Shares in Taipei .TWII rose as much as 1.1% to the highest level since February 21, while those in Seoul .KS11 rose as much as 2.1% to mark the best session since late June. Vietnam's stock index .VNI jumped more than 2.5% to a record high of 1,567.8 points.

Equity markets in Jakarta .JKSE added 0.2%, while those in Kuala Lumpur .KLSE and Bangkok .SETI added more than 0.5%, respectively. Japan's Nikkei .N225 rallied, with data showing a jump in the nation's service sector activity in July.

U.S. equity benchmarks posted their strongest single-day rallies in over two months on Monday, with bargain hunters driving the rebound from Friday's losses after the jobs data. .N

Odds for a September rate cut now stand at about 94%, according to CME Fedwatch, up from a 63% chance seen on July 28. MKTS/GLOB

Trade tensions escalated as U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday threatened to raise tariffs on goods from India over its Russian oil purchases, while New Delhi called his attack "unjustified" and vowed to protect its economic interests.

The Indian rupee INR=IN slipped 0.2% and Mumbai stocks .NSEI also fell 0.2%. India's central bank likely sold U.S. dollars via state-run banks ahead of Tuesday's onshore spot market open to stem the rupee's decline, four traders told Reuters.

Trump's tariff offensive hit Asian countries with rates ranging between 15% and 40% on imports to the U.S. India faces the steepest levies of major Asian economies other than China at 25%, while South Korea negotiated down to 15% after intensive talks.

"Avoiding a much larger reciprocal tariff is still a relief and will remove a key overhang from markets," said Jen-Ai Chua, research analyst for Asia equities at Julius Baer.

"Going forward, sectoral tariffs, in particular tariffs on semiconductors, could have outsized implications, given their contributions to total exports to the US for Malaysia, Thailand and Singapore."

Malaysia will spend up to $150 billion in the next five years to buy equipment from U.S. multinationals for its semiconductor, aerospace and data centre sectors as part of a deal with Washington to cut tariffs, its trade minister said on Monday.

Asian currencies were largely subdued as the U.S. dollar recouped some of its losses from the last two sessions. USD/

The Philippine peso PHP= and South Korean won KRW=KFTC slipped marginally by 0.2%. Malaysian ringgit MYR= was the only outlier, adding more than 0.2%, while the Indonesian rupiah IDR= was largely unchanged after annual economic growth in the country beat expectations in the second quarter.

HIGHLIGHTS:

** South Korea July consumer inflation +2.1% y/y

** Philippine inflation at near 6-year low

(Reporting by Roushni Nair in Bengaluru; Additional reporting by Ankur Banerjee in Singapore; Editing by Jamie Freed)

((Roushni.Nair@thomsonreuters.com))