Asian markets fall on Nasdaq drop

Tech shares fell sharply on Friday, dragged down by Wall Street's overnight fall

HONG KONG, China -- Markets throughout the region took a beating Friday, battered by Nasdaq's 3.35 percent overnight tumble.

With the Tokyo market closed for the Golden Week holiday, investor interest was focused on markets in Australia, Korea and Hong Kong.

In Australia, the benchmark S&P/ASX 200 index was down 13.7 points to 3,336.3 at noon, having wiped out most of Thursday's gains.

In Seoul, the Kospi was down 2.47 points to 581.93, while in Hong Kong the Hang Seng index dropped sharply, losing almost 2 percent or 256.98 points to be at 13,461.16.74 just before noon

Hong Kong stocks were led down by global banking giant HSBC Holdings and blue chip technology stocks like China Mobile and Legend Holdings.

In Seoul, shares got off to a weaker start as mobile giant SK Telecom led the decline ahead of its release of first quarter results. SK Telecom slid 2.14 percent to 228,500 won in heavy trade.

Wireless telecom service operators were weighed down by local reports the government would advance the plan to cut mobile phone rates from the second half of this year.

KT Freetel, the mobile unit of Korea Telecom, declined 3.1 percent to 46,500 won. Top heavyweight Samsung Electronics was off 2.61 percent at 224,000 won.

In Taiwan, shares were flat in early trade. The benchmark TAIEX was down 0.13 percent at 5,398.46. In the Philippines, stocks were up slightly.

Westpac down, despite solid profit

In Australia, banks remained out of favor, having lost their defensive gloss some time ago.

Shares in Australia's third largest bank Westpac were down 15 cents, or 1.2 percent, at A$12.88 after the bank delivered a solid but unsurprising six month profit result.

Westpac posted a 13 percent rise in interim net profit to A$924 million but warned that Australia's economic slowdown would cut into profit growth in the second half of the financial year.

Rothschild Australia's head of domestic equities Andrew Brown noted that if the U.S. Federal Reserve delivers another rate cut, that could spur Australian miners higher.

Mining giant BHP recovered from earlier weakness to be up 14 cents at A$21.62 but investors are still awaiting for details of its planned dual-listing with merger partner the London listed Billiton Plc .

News Corp loses a little ground

News Corp lost further ground, down 41 cents or 2.1 percent to $18.75. Investors are hoping the media groupt will soon gain control of the largest satellite TV group in the United States, DirecTV.

Australian wine producer BRL Hardy is to lodge a bid for the United States' Kendall-Jackson Wine Estates, pushing the Australian producer's share price down 28 cents to A$8.50.

The move could cost BRL as much as US$2 billion, a big bite for a company capitalized at just A$1.3 billion.

Reuters contributed to this report.

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