Asian stock markets are lower on Friday following the mixed cues from Wall Street and as investors turned cautious ahead of the G-7 summit starting in Canada later today. Worries about the sell-off in emerging markets overnight also dampened sentiment.
The Australian market is flat, paring initial losses. In late-morning trades, the benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Index is declining 1.10 points or 0.02 percent to 6,056.20, after touching a low of 6,041.40 earlier. The broader All Ordinaries Index is down 1.30 points or 0.02 percent to 6,168.10.
Among the major miners, BHP Billiton is edging down less than 0.1 percent and Fortescue Metals is declining 0.2 percent.
Rio Tinto has committed to a 200 million yuan, or A$41 million, joint venture with state-owned China Minmetals to explore mineral deposits in China. The mining giant's shares are adding 0.2 percent.
Gold miners are weak even as gold prices edged higher overnight. Evolution Mining is down 0.2 percent and Newcrest Mining is losing more than 1 percent.
Banking stocks are also mostly lower. National Australia Bank is adding 0.1 percent, while ANZ Banking, Westpac and Commonwealth Bank are lower in a range of 0.1 percent to 0.2 percent.
Oil stocks are also weak despite a nearly 2 percent increase in crude oil prices. Santos is lower by 0.4 percent and Oil Search is declining 0.2 percent, while Woodside Petroleum is edging less than 0.1 percent.
Bubs Australia has secured a deal to sell its products on China's largest e-commerce platform Alibaba. The infant formula maker's shares are rising more than 4 percent.
AMP, which was hit with a fourth shareholder class action lawsuit over the scandals disclosed at the banking royal commission, has been removed the from ASX20 index, effective June 18. However, the wealth management company's shares are adding 0.3 percent.
Tabcorp said it is in talks with News Corp's UK subsidiary, News UK, to quit the pair's Sun Bets online gaming venture. The gaming giant's shares are rising almost 2 percent.
In the currency market, the Australian dollar is lower against a weakened U.S. dollar on Friday. The local unit was trading at US$0.7617, down from US$0.7647 on Thursday.
The Japanese market is modestly lower in choppy trade following the mixed cues from Wall Street and on a stronger yen. Weak Japanese economic data also weighed on the markets.
In late-morning trades, the benchmark Nikkei 225 Index is down 27.13 points or 0.12 percent to 22,796.13, off a low of 22,727.73 earlier.
Among the major exporters, Panasonic is declining more than 1 percent, Sony is lower by 0.5 percent and Mitsubishi Electric is down 0.2 percent, while Canon is up adding 0.2 percent.
Automaker Toyota is edging lower by less than 0.1 percent, while Honda is adding almost 1 percent following news that the company and General Motors have agreed to jointly develop next-generation batteries for electric vehicles.
In the banking sector, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial is down 0.2 percent and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial is lower by almost 1 percent.
Among oil stocks, Inpex is rising 0.7 percent, while Japan Petroleum Exploration is down 0.3 percent despite crude oil prices rising overnight.
Among the market's best performers, Nippon Express is rising more than 6 percent and Takara Holdings is gaining more than 3 percent. Dena Co. and TDK Corp. are up almost 3 percent each.
On the flip side, Hitachi Construction Machinery is losing almost 5 percent, while Sumco Corp. and Advantest are down almost 3 percent each.
In economic news, the Cabinet Office said that Japan's gross domestic product was down 0.2 percent on quarter in the first three months of 2018. That was unchanged from the May 16 preliminary reading, although it defied expectations for an upward revision to -0.1 percent.
The Ministry of Finance said that Japan had a current account surplus of 1.845 trillion yen in April, down 6.8 percent on year. That missed expectations for a surplus of 2.076 trillion yen following the 3.122 trillion yen surplus in March.
The trade surplus was 573.8 billion yen - also missing estimates for 746.4 billion yen and down from 1.190 trillion yen in the previous month.
The Bank of Japan said that overall bank lending in Japan was up 2.0 percent on year in May, coming in at 523.137 trillion yen. That was shy of estimates for 2.1 percent, which would have been unchanged from the April reading.
In the currency market, the U.S. dollar is trading in the upper 109 yen-range on Friday.
Elsewhere in Asia, Shanghai and Hong Kong are losing more than 1 percent each, while South Korea, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Taiwan are also lower. Bucking the trend, New Zealand is modestly higher.
On Wall Street, stocks turned in a mixed performance on Thursday. The Dow rose following a gain by shares of McDonald's Corp. after the Wall Street Journal said the fast food giant is planning a fresh round of layoffs to further shrink its corporate structure. Meanwhile, the pullback by the Nasdaq may partly have been due to profit taking after the tech-heavy index rose to new record highs in recent sessions.
The Dow climbed 95.02 points or 0.4 percent to 25,241.41, but the Nasdaq slid 54.17 points or 0.7 percent to 7,635.07 and the S&P 500 edged down 1.98 points or 0.1 percent to 2,770.37.
The major European markets moved modestly lower on Thursday. While the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index edged down by 0.1 percent, the French CAC 40 Index and the German DAX Index both dipped by 0.2 percent.
Crude oil futures rose Thursday, trimming recent losses after sliding to the lowest in two months. WTI crude for July delivery jumped $1.22 or 1.9 percent to $65.95 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
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