Investing.com - Asian shares were mostly weaker on Thursday with Shanghai bucking the trend as investors digested the prospect of a Federal Reserve rate hike as soon as June.
The Nikkei 225 fell 0.12%, while the S&P/ASX 200 edged down 0.83%.
The Shanghai Composite Index was last up 0.60%, while Hong Kong's Hang Seng index was last down 0.36%.
In Australia, employment data showed a gain of 10,800 jobs, compared to 12,500 expected in April, with an unemployment rate at 5.7%, below the 5.8% level seen, and a participation rate of 64.8%, a tad lower than expected.
Earlier, in Japan, core machinery orders jumped 3.2%, well above the 0.8% gain seen for March year-on-year and at 5.5% pace month-on-month, beating a 0.5% rise expected. The Cabinet Office projects core machinery orders will slip 3.5% in the April-June quarter in reaction to a 6.7% rise in January-March, indicating the pace of a pickup remains gradual.
On Wednesday, in Japan, data showed that the economy grew by an annualized 1.7% in the three months to March, well ahead of forecasts for a 0.2% increase and recovering from a 1.7% contraction in the previous quarter.
The yuan fell against the dollar on Thursday after the People's Bank of China set the fixing weaker for a second consecutive day at 6.5531
from the previous 6.5216, the biggest daily drop since a decline of 0.59% on May 4.
Overnight, U.S. stocks were mixed after the close on Wednesday, as gains in the Financials, Technology and Healthcare sectors led shares higher while losses in the Utilities, Basic Materials and Telecoms sectors led shares lower.
At the close in NYSE, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.02% to hit a new 1-month low, while the S&P 500 index gained 0.02%, and the NASDAQ Composite index added 0.50%.