Investing.com - Asian shares fell on Tuesday as mixed trade data out of China had little to cheer outside of a slower pace of decline than expected in imports and other regional data added to the outlook.
The S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.79%, the Shanghai Composite eased 1.52%. The Nikkei 225 dropped 1.03%.
In China, key trade data for November showed a 6.8% drop in exports, more than the 5.0% decline seen, and imports down 8.7%, less than the 12.6% drop expected, The overall surplus came in at $54.10 billion, compared to an expected $63.30 billion.
Earlier, in Japan, bank lending rose 2.3% as expected year-on-year in November, while the current account for October came in at a surplus of ¥1.458 trillion, slightly narrower than the expected ¥1.659 trillion surplus.
Also in Japan, third quarter GDP surged 1.0% year-on-year compared to a 0.1% gain seen and rose 0.3% quarter-on-quarter compared to a 0.1% gain expected.
In Australia, the NAB business confidence survey rose to 5 in November from 2 in the previous month, while the business survey rose to 10 from 9.
"This is basically another strong result for the NAB survey which, in conjunction with signs of improvement in the labor market, means we can put more faith in the building non-mining sector recovery," NAB chief economist Alan Oster said.
Overnight, U.S. stocks were lower after the close on Monday, as losses in the Oil & Gas, Basic Materials and Financials sectors led shares lower.
At the close in NYSE, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.66%, while the S&P 500 index fell 0.70%, and the NASDAQ Composite index lost 0.79%.