Asia markets stumbled on Friday, with sentiment weighed by the British pound's sharp drop in early trade, while traders likely took to the sidelines ahead of the key U.S. September jobs report due later the global day.
The Nikkei 225 Index dropped 39.01 points, or 0.2%, to 16,860.09
In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng index unloaded 100.68 points, or 0.4%, to 23,851.82
In company news, shares of Samsung Electronics closed up 0.9% at 1,706,000 Korean won a share, touching a record high.
Before market open, the consumer electronics giant issued earnings guidance, where it said it expected third-quarter operating profit to be approximately 7.8 trillion won ($7 billion U.S.). A pickup in its components business likely offset the impact of the Galaxy Note 7 smartphone recall.
That beat a Thomson Reuters StarMine SmartEstimate of analysts' forecasts that predicted Samsung's profit was around 7.4 trillion won in the July-September period.
In Hong Kong, China's eight largest brokerage firm by assets, China Merchants Securities, made a lackluster trading debut. It traded at 12.02 Hong Kong dollars as of late afternoon with an initial public offering (IPO) price of HK$12.00.
Most sectors in Australia finished lower, but the heavily-weighted financial sub-index edged up 0.1% and the energy sector advanced 0.7%.
Major Australian banks finished mostly up, with Commonwealth Bank of Australia shares up 0.3% Westpac advancing 0.6% and the National Australia Bank gaining 0.1%. ANZ shares were nearly flat.
The Australian dollar traded at $0.7566 U.S., falling from levels near $0.7660 reached earlier in the week.
In the currency market, the British pound dropped sharply, touching fresh three-decade lows. In what was being described as a "flash crash," the sterling dropped as low as $1.1819 U.S. briefly, before climbing back up to around $1.2437 as late afternoon in Asia.
Foreign exchange strategists at Australia's Macquarie Bank wrote in a note to clients that while the pound may recover to the $1.25 U.S. mark later in the global day, "all technical support has now been obliterated, so sterling is doomed from here over the months ahead."
The Japanese yen was weaker against the dollar, which was fetching 103.88 yen, compared with levels below 101.00 yen in the previous week.
The off-shore yuan, which is more freely traded, weakened against the dollar, trading at 6.7141 U.S., compared with levels near 6.68 in the previous week.
In other markets
Markets in Shanghai remained shuttered all this week.
In Korea, the Kospi dumped 11.5 points, or 0.6%, to 2,053.80
The Straits Times Index in Singapore gave back 9.98 points, or 0.4%, to 2,875.24
In Taiwan, the Taiex Index slid 18.5 points, or 0.2%, to 9,265.81
In New Zealand, the NZX 50 sank 29.48 points, or 0.4%, to 7,167.81
In Australia, the ASX 200 moved lower 15.64 points, or 0.3%, to 5,467.39
