Shares in Asia-Pacific fell on Friday as China left its benchmark lending rate unchanged.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index plunged 1.84% to close at 24,849.72, with Friday’s losses leaving the index more than 20% lower from its mid-February high.
Most Chinese tech shares in Hong Kong continued to see another day of heavy losses as regulatory uncertainty surrounding the sector lingered. Shares of Meituan dropped 4.54% while Alibaba fell 2.59% and JD.com declined 2.11%. Tencent, on the other hand, rose 1%. The Hang Seng Tech index shed 2.46% to 5,895.06.
Mainland Chinese stocks also closed lower as the Shanghai composite declined 1.1% to 3,427.33 and the Shenzhen component slipped 1.614% to 14,253.53.
China’s one-year loan prime rate (LPR) and five-year LPR were both left unchanged at 3.85% and 4.65%, respectively, on Friday. That was in line with expectations of majority of traders and analysts in a snap poll, according to Reuters.
The Nikkei 225 in Japan fell 0.98% to close at 27,013.25 while the Topix index shed 0.87% to end the trading day at 1,880.68.
Japanese automaker shares continued to see losses on Friday, with Toyota Motor falling 4.09% while
Nissan Motor dropped 7.25% and Honda Motor declined 4.84%.
That came following Toyota’s Thursday announcement that it will slash global production for September by 40% from its previous plan, Reuters reported. Shares of Toyota plunged more than 4% on Thursday after the Nikkei first reported on the firm’s plan.
Elsewhere, South Korea’s Kospi declined 1.2% while the S&P/ASX 200 in Australia closed fractionally lower at 7,460.90.
In Southeast Asia, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI Index in Malaysia advanced 0.2% to 1,518.03. Malaysia’s palace on Friday announced that the king named Ismail Sabri Yaakob as the new prime minister — the country’s third in three years. The announcement was made near the time the local stock markets closed.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan slipped 1.13%.
Overnight stateside, the S&P 500 gained about 0.13% to 4,405.80 while the Nasdaq Composite advanced 0.11% to 14,541.79. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lagged, slipping 66.57 points to 34,894.12.
Currencies and oil
The U.S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of its peers, was at 93.671 following its climb earlier this week from below 93.
The Japanese yen traded at 109.65 per dollar, stronger than levels above 110 seen against the greenback yesterday. The Australian dollar changed hands at $0.711, having declined from above $0.728 earlier in the week.
Oil prices were lower in the afternoon of Asia trading hours, with international benchmark Brent crude futures down 0.45% to $66.14 per barrel. U.S. crude futures declined 0.36% to $63.46 per barrel.