Asian stocks close mixed, end week with gains

By Ovunc Kutlu

ANKARA (AA) - Major stock markets in Asia closed mixed on Friday, but they ended the week with gains due to their rally at the first half of this week.

The Asia Dow, which includes blue-chip companies in the region, was up 11 points, or 0.3%, to 3,923 at 1000GMT. It was up 1.43% for the week.

Tokyo's Nikkei 225 stock exchange, on the other hand, decreased 37 points, or 0.14%, to dive below the critical support level of 28,000 points at 27,977. The index, however, posted a 0.56% gain this week.

The Hang Seng, the benchmark for blue-chip stocks trading on the Hong Kong stock exchange, plummeted 126 points, or 0.48%, to 26,391, while it had a weekly rise of 0.81%.

China's Shanghai stock exchange was down 8 points, or 0.24%, to 3,516 points, but it soared 1.67% this week.

Asian indices having a three-day winning streak from Monday through Wednesday helped them post weekly gains.

After hitting record levels on Thursday, major indices in Europe were still strong as five of them posted new all-time highs.

The STOXX Europe 600, which includes around 90% of the market capitalization of the European market in 17 countries, saw a new record high of 476.16 before retreating to 475.79 at the time.

London's FTSE 100 saw a new all-time high of 7,224.13 earlier in the session, but it was trading at 7,215 points at the time for a 0.3% gain.

Germany's DAX 30 was up 80 points, 0.5%, to 16,018 after seeing a fresh all-time high of 16,030.33 earlier during the session.

The French CAC 40 renewed its record with 6,911.76 -- a 0.43% increase.

Italy's FTSE MIB was up 0.3% at 26,637 points after posting a new all-time high of 26,674.61.

Spain's IBEX 35 was the only major index that did not reach a record high, but it was up 0.3% to climb above the psychological level of 9,000 points at 9,005.