Asian shares slip on trade war concern

Asian stock markets slipped Friday as Beijing responded to the Trump administration's tariff hikes by saying it may order higher import duties on a range of US goods, ratcheting up fears of a trade war.

The fear rippled into Asia, where shares tumbled in early trading. By late morning in Japan, the benchmark Nikkei 225 index was down 3.5 per cent at 20,827.92.

South Korea's Kospi tumbled 2.3 per cent to 2,438.03. Hong Kong's Hang Seng lost 3.2 per cent to 30,090.32 and the Shanghai Composite in mainland China sank 2.7 per cent to 3,169.19.

Australia's S&P/ASX 200 skidded 1.9 per cent to 5,824.50, reports AP.

Stocks plunged Thursday on Wall Street. The Dow Jones industrial average dropped more than 700 points as investors feared that trade tensions between the world's largest economies would escalate.

The S&P 500 index skidded 2.5 per cent to 2,643.69. The Dow Jones industrial average sank 2.9 per cent to 23,957.89. The Nasdaq composite gave up 2.4 per cent to 7,166.68.

Microsoft fell $2.69, or 2.9 per cent, to $89.79 and Alphabet, Google's parent company, fell $40.85, or 3.7 per cent, to $1,053.15. Online retailer Amazon slid $36.94, or 2.3 per cent, to $1,544.92.

The dollar fell to 104.87 yen from 105.28 yen in late trading Thursday. The euro rose to $1.2337 from $1.2302.

Oil futures rallied. Benchmark US crude rose 95 cents to $65.27 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.