CANBERA (dpa-AFX) - Asian stocks ended mostly lower in cautious trade on Friday as investors digested a mixed set of U.S. earnings and awaited the release of U.S. first-quarter gross domestic product data due out later in the day for directional cues.
Chinese stocks fell to post their steepest weekly decline since October 2018 as concern deepened about the prospect of the government scaling back stimulus.
The benchmark Shanghai Composite index ended down 37.43 points or 1.20 percent at 3,086.40, taking the weekly loss to 5.6 percent. Hong Kong's Hang Seng index inched up 0.19 percent to 29,605.01.
Japanese shares ended slightly lower as the country heads into its 10-day Golden Week holiday beginning this weekend. A raft of mixed local economic data also weighed on markets.
Retail sales in Japan rose 0.2 percent sequentially in March, a government report showed. That beat expectations for a flat reading and was down from the 0.4 percent increase in February.
Industrial output fell 0.9 percent on month in the month, missing expectations for a flat reading following the 0.7 percent increase in February.
Overall consumer prices in the Tokyo area were up an annual 1.4 percent in April, while the jobless rate came in at a seasonally adjusted 2.5 percent in March.
The Nikkei average dropped 48.85 points or 0.22 percent to 22,258.73 while the broader Topix index closed 0.15 percent lower at 1,617.93.
Tech stocks paced the decliners, with Advantest tumbling 8.9 percent and Tokyo Electron declining 1.2 percent.
Australian markets ended little changed in light trade as trading resumed after the ANZAC Day holiday on Thursday.
The big four banks inched up between 0.1 percent and 0.6 percent ahead of earnings due next week.
Investment bank Macquarie Group edged up 0.2 percent ahead of its annual results due on May 3. Scandal-hit wealth manager AMP gave up 1.3 percent.
Gold miners Evolution and Newcrest rallied 2-3 percent as gold remained on track to post its first weekly gain in five.
Mining heavyweights BHP and Rio Tinto dropped 1.6 percent and 0.8 percent, respectively after China's steel futures fell for the third straight session on Thursday. Smaller rival Fortescue Metals Group slumped 5.4 percent.
Travel agency Flight Centre Travel Group plunged 11.7 percent after a profit downgrade. Bellamy's Australia declined 1.2 percent on profit taking after climbing almost 16 percent on Wednesday.
Energy stocks Origin Energy, Oil Search, Santos and Woodside Petroleum all fell over 1 percent after crude oil prices declined overnight.
Seoul stocks fell for a third consecutive session on economic worries after data on Thursday showed the country's GDP shrank the most in a decade in the first quarter of 2019.
The benchmark Kospi dropped 11.19 points or 0.51 percent to 2,179.31. Tech stocks succumbed to heavy selling pressure, with SK Hynix losing 2 percent and LG Electronics declining 2.9 percent.
New Zealand shares fell notably, with the benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index ending down 77.17 points or 0.77 percent at 9,994.57 despite encouraging economic data.
New Zealand posted a merchandise trade surplus of NZ$922 million in March, Statistics New Zealand said in a report - beating forecasts for NZ$131 million and up sharply from NZ$12 million in February. Exports were up 19.0 percent month-on-month to a record NZ$5.70 billion.
ANZ Bank's consumer confidence index rose 1.1 percent sequentially to a reading of 123.2 in April, following the 0.8 percent gain in March.
Overnight, U.S. stocks fluctuated before ending mostly lower, as disappointing earnings reports from several industrial sector companies offset strong results from the likes of Facebook and Microsoft as well as encouraging durable goods orders data.
The Dow dipped half a percent and the S&P 500 slipped marginally, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite rose 0.2 percent.
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