Shares in most of Asia plunged as traders held back and weighed the latest news on the rising trade anxiety between the US and China as global equity recouped a splinter of Friday's losses.
Laggard equities from Japan led the top decliners, with South Korean and Australian shares ushering the bell lower. The S&P 500 fell late Friday when Bloomberg disclosed US President Donald Trump and his team of economists are looking into imposing huge restrictions on capital investments.
Stocks from mainland China, however, edged up late Monday, with the Shenzhen component inching up at 0.88 percent to 9,548.95. The Shanghai composite gained 0.10 percent to about 2,932.16.
Sales from China's factory and the industrial front was down 2 percent in August, compared from a year ago, the National Bureau of Statistics reported. The figure follows a 2.5 percent climb from the previous month, and a 3.2 percent drop from June.
According to a finance official, the US does not plan to halt China's private establishments from being a member of its stock exchanges. In the US, treasuries remained unchanged with ten-year output steady at 1.67 percent. In Beijing, traders buckle down to their last day of sessions as they head for a seven-day holiday.
As China and the US prepare for top-level trade discussions next month, news of a looming restriction on American portfolio flows in the Asian region jolted exchange-traded funds (ETFs) keeping an eye on China's big market players.
China reiterated its stance by saying it would continue to allow foreign investors to do business in its financial markets. Liu He, Chinese vice premier, will lead the country's negotiating panel to the US middle of October.
Global stock markets are seen to further slow down in the coming weeks as volatility continues to rear its ugly head considering unresolved matters around trade and the tension in Iran, Trump's impeachment and mixed trade numbers, analysts said. In Taipei, money markets and business offices are set to be closed as storm Mitag nears landfall.
In currencies, the Japanese yen remained unchanged at 107.94 per US dollar while the offshore yuan was pegged at 7.1385 per USD, the euro at $1.0941, while the British currency was also unchanged at $1.2290.
The greenback index, which monitors the currency against a host of its counterparts, last hovered at 99.259 after treading from levels under 99.1 during the previous session.
In commodities, gold was unmoved at $1,496.62 per ounce while the West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude rallied 0.5 percent to $56.10 per barrel.
