Asian stocks mixed ahead of NFP, China re-opens

The Asian equity markets extended losses on the final trading day of this week, tracking a subdued close on the Wall Street overnight. While the Chinese traders returned to markets after a week-long Lunar New Year break.

The Chinese markets tumbled, playing catch-up with the recent stock market volatility induced by Trump policies. Further, the domestic indices fell after the PBOC raised the interest rates on open market operations (OMOs) by 10 basis points, in a bid to tighten liquidity.

The declines in China markets drove most Asian indices lower. Also, worse-than expected Chinese manufacturing PMI added to the persisting risk-off tone in the markets and dragged the Asian equities further into negative territory. China's Jan 2017 Caixin manufacturing PMI came at 51.0 vs 51.8 expected and 51.9 last.

Attention now turns towards the all-important US non-farm payrolls data due to be reported later in the NA session. The data is likely to influence the Fed rate hike prospects and USD demand in the coming months.

Meanwhile, the Japanese benchmark, the Nikkei 225 index trades marginally higher at 18,961. The Australian benchmark, ASX 200 index drops -0.30% to 5,628 points. Hong Kong markets decline -0.44% to 23,085. Mainland China markets stumble, with the Shanghai Composite index down -0.56%, while Shenzhen’s CSI 300 index falls -0.61% to 3,367 points.