Asian markets ended on a mixed note Tuesday after a volatile session that saw indexes in Tokyo, Shanghai, Seoul, Singapore, Taipei, Jakarta and Bangkok waver between negative and positive territories.
The Nikkei 225 index fell 0.7 percent, to 13,824.7 on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index rose 1.9 percent to 23, 714.8.
Toyota Motor Corp. fell 0.33 percent, Nippon Steel lost 2.21 percent and major cell phone carrier NTT DoCoMo dropped 1.31 percent.
Shares of Sony Corp. gained 1.2% after the Nikkei business daily reported the company will enter a joint venture with Sharp Corp. to take a stake in Sharp's liquid crystal display panel factory. The plant is under construction in Japan's Osaka prefecture. Sharp's shares finished unchanged.
Shanghai-listed shares turned volatile after four days of declines. The Shanghai Composite index, which tracks both the yuan-denominated A shares and the foreign currency-denominated B shares, ended 1.1% higher at 4,238.18 after dropping as low as 4,123.31 in the afternoon.
Elsewhere:
Australia's S&P/ASX 200 gained 0.8% at 5,666.10.
New Zealand's NZX 50 index dropped 0.8% to 3,543.26
India's Sensitive Index, or Sensex, advanced 0.9% to 17,806.19.
South Korea's Kospi ended unchanged at 1,709.13.
Singapore's Straits Times Index climbed 0.4% to 3,077.83.
Taiwan's Weighted index advanced 0.3% to 8,307.67.
Indonesia's Jakarta Composite fell 0.5% to 2,738.87.
Thailand's SET declined 0.5% to 834.67.
with files from other wire services
