Asian stocks ended mixed on Thursday, with Japanese markets falling on a stronger yen and Hong Kong up for the sixth straight day, this time led by technology shares.
Japan’s Nikkei 225 index dumped 107.55 points, or 0.8%, to 14,298.21.
Meanwhile, the yen strengthened against the U.S. dollar, trading at ¥101.867 from ¥101.812 on Wednesday.
The Hang Seng Index in Hong Kong improved 148.09 points, or 0.7%, to 22,730.86
In Japan, Sony Corp. led losses with a 6.1% decline, after the electronics giant predicted another net loss in the fiscal year ending in March 2015.
Other market movers included Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group, down 3%, brokerage firm Daiwai Securities Group, down 2%, NEC Corp. , down 2%, and Olympus Corp., down 1.9%.
In Hong Kong, online major Tencent Holdings shot up 5.8%, after the company announced a 60% profit jump for the first quarter. Online transaction-service provider China Binary Sale Technology soared 10%, software developer Kingsoft Corp. jumped 6.1%, and smaller rival Kingdee International Software Group climbed 3.2%.
Japan’s GDP figures, released before the market open, showed the first three months of the year were a boom time for the economy. Seasonally adjusted real gross domestic product surged 5.9% higher on an annualized basis, blowing away the 0.1% gain in the last quarter of 2013.
Helping drive the powerful expansion was private consumption, which surged an annualized 8.5%. However, this was likely more a reflection of Japanese consumers rushing to buy ahead of the April 1 consumption-tax hike, so economists are expecting a weak reading for the current quarter.
In other markets;
Shanghai’s CSI 300 Composite dipped 28.29 points, or 1.3%, to 2,144.08
Taiwan’s Taiex Index gained 5.49 points, or 0.1%, to 8,880.65
Singapore’s Straits Times Index gathered 13.40 points, or 0.4%, to 3,272.49
Korea’s Kospi index doffed 0.63 points to 2,010.20
New Zealand NZX 50 index fell 18.40 points, or 0.4%, to 5,194.96
Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 recovered 14.34 points, or 0.3%, to 5,510.84.
