Investing.com - Asian shares fell on Friday as investors ignored overnight gains on Wall Street and upbeat regional data in Australia.
The Nikkei 225 fell 0.41%, while the S&P/ASX 200 fell 0.79%.
In Australia, data on home loans month-on-month for November showed a surprise 1.8% gain from a 0.5% drop seen, while with investment housing finance rose 0.7%, recovering from a 6.1% drop the previous month.
In Australia, data on home loans month-on-month for November showed a surprise 1.8% gain from a 0.5% drop seen, while with investment housing finance rose 0.7%, recovering from a 6.1% drop the previous month.
In China, the yuan rose Friday despite a weaker fixing from the People's Bank of China. The yuan last traded 0.03% stronger at 6.5869 against the U.S. dollar compared with Thursday's official close of 6.5887. The PBOC set the yuan fixing at 6.5637 compared with Thursday's 6.5616.
Share prices fell as well with investors cautious. Shares of coal and steel companies led declines. The Shanghai Composite Index was last down 1.54% to 2,961.47. Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index was last down 0.77% to 19,665.77.
Overnight, U.S. stocks rallied on Thursday erasing most of their losses from the previous day's sell-off, amid a major rebound in oil prices and indications that the Federal Reserve could delay the pace of its first tightening cycle in nearly a decade.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average surged 227.64 or 1.41% to 16,379.05, while the NASDAQ Composite index jumped 88.93 or 1.96% to 4,615.00, as both completed one of their strongest one-day moves in approximately six weeks. The S&P 500 Composite index, meanwhile, gained 31.56 or 1.67% to 1,921.84, to eclipse a key technical level. For the session, all 10 sectors closed in the green, as stocks in the Energy, Health Care and Technology sectors led, each gaining more than 2%.