Investing.com - Asian shares slumped on Friday on what the market took as tepid moves by the European Central Bank to ease further and growing expectations of a Federal Reserve rate hike this month with the last piece of the data puzzle, nonfarm payrolls, ahead.
The Nikkei 225 fell 1.92% while the Shanghai Composite eased 0.92% and the S&P/ASX 200 dropped 1.72%.
In Australia, retail sales for October gained 0.5% as expected month-on-month.
In Japan, average cash earnings for October rose a health 0.7%, the fourth straight rise, and beating the year-on-year 0.4% gain seen.
Overnight, U.S. stocks accelerated their sell-off late in Thursday's session falling sharply on the day, amid limited increases in the European Central Bank's quantitative easing program and dovish comments from Janet Yellen on the likelihood of an interest rate hike from the Federal Reserve.
ECB President Mario Draghi said the bank will expand its bond-buying purchase scheme beyond the current cut-off point of September 2016 until the end of March 2017, or beyond if necessary.
The ECB extended the range of assets that are eligible for purchase and will now also buy regional and local government debt and will reinvest the proceeds from quantitative easing as bonds mature.
The pace of the QE program is to remain unchanged at €60 billion, disappointing expectations that the central bank would speed up its bond-buying scheme.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average plunged 252.01 or 1.42% to 17,477.67, as investors digested FBI reports that the suspect in Wednesday's shooting in Southern California appeared to be radicalized. At one point on Thursday afternoon, the Dow fell by more than 300 points extending losses from Wednesday's sell-off. The NASDAQ Composite index, meanwhile, lost 85.69 or 1.67% to 5,037.53, as interest-rate sensitive stocks in the Utilities and Home Building sectors took a hit following aggressive upward moves in U.S. 10-Year bond yields.
The S&P 500 Composite fell into negative territory for the year, as stocks in all 10 sectors closed in the red on Thursday. Stocks in the Health Care, Energy and Financials industries lagged, each falling by more than 1.5% on the day. With the losses the S&P 500 closed on Thursday at 2,049.62, down 29.89 or 1.44% on the session.