Asia's markets traded mixed on Monday, with many markets retracing initial weakness that had followed Wall Street's sharp losses on Friday.
The Nikkei 225 index shed 70.78 points, or 0.4%, to 19,916.02
The Hang Seng index in Hong Kong gained 36.12 points, or 0.2%, to 21,791.68
Energy shares might be finding some support on expectations oil prices might be nearing a bottom.
In Japan, Inpex tacked on 0.3% and in Australia, several energy plays posted strong gains. LNG rose 8.8% and Santos tacked on 4.1%. Hong Kong-listed shares of Cnooc added 1.7%, while Sinopec rose 1.1%.
The Bank of Japan kept monetary policy unchanged as expected, but the central bank announced a new program to purchase ETFs at annual pace of 300 billion yen ($2.45 billion U.S). This is in addition to the bank's existing ETF purchase program which increases holdings at an annual pace of about three trillion yen.
The BOJ's moves pushed up the yen against the U.S. dollar, likely weighing on shares of exporters. The greenback was fetching 121.33 yen in afternoon trade Monday, compared with around 122.40 yen before the decision Friday.
Among exporters, Toyota dropped 1% and Sony fell 1.9%.
Toshiba plunged 9.8 percent after Dow Jones reported over the weekend that people familiar with the matter said the company is likely to post a full year net loss of around 500 billion yen, or $4.1 billion U.S. After the market close, Toshiba said it expects to post a fiscal year net loss of 550 billion yen.
Sharp was unchanged after the Nikkei business daily reported over the weekend that U.S. buyout firm KKR & Co. was among the private equity firms interested in investing in the company.
In Hong Kong and China, shares traded higher after initially swinging between positive and negative territory. Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index was up 0.4% and the Shanghai Composite added 1.8%.
Banks were higher, with Bank of China's mainland-listed shares up 0.7% while its Hong Kong-listed ones were up 0.6%. Hong Kong-listed property shares were mixed, with Shimao Property off 1.4%, Greentown up 4.1% and Hysan Development losing 0.9%
In South Korea, heavyweight exporters were mixed, with Samsung Electronics rising 0.2% and Hyundai Motor off 1.3%
Samsung Engineering rose 0.3% after saying it won a $552-million U.S. order after the share rose more than 8 percent in total last week
In Australia, shares of Crown Resorts rose 4.1% after news that Australian tycoon James Packer, who owns more than half of the casino company, quit the board.
In other markets
The CSI 300 in Shanghai triumphed 98.05 points, or 2.6%, to 3,865.97
In Singapore, the Straits Times Index dropped 7.29 points, or 0.3%, to 2,845.55
The Kospi index in Korea regained 5.87 points, or 0.3%, to 1,981.19
Taiwan’s Taiex index picked up 24.85 points, or 0.3%, to 8,282.17
In New Zealand, the NZX 50 added 12.98 points, or 0.2%, to 6,120.82
The ASX 200 inched up 2.39 points, or 0.1%, to 5,109.05
