By Gokhan Ergocun
ISTANBUL (AA) - After a difficult week in global markets due to concerns over another rise in COVID-19 cases and climbing inflationary expectations, Asian stocks closed the week with mixed figures.
The Asia Dow, which includes blue-chip companies in the region, lost 14.89 points, or 0.38%, to close at nearly 3,890 points. The index closed last week at 3,930 points.
Tokyo's Nikkei 225 stock exchange was up 72.60 points, or 0.25%, to 28,892. The index was also up from 28,804 points at last week’s close.
The Hang Seng, the benchmark for blue-chip stocks trading on the Hong Kong stock exchange, saw a decline of 178.49 points, or 0.7%, to 25,337, while it was at 26,126 points at last week’s close.
China's Shanghai stock exchange was up by 28.92 points, or 0.82%, to reach 3,547 points, posting a slight decrease from last week’s close, 3,582.
The Indian Sensex benchmark saw a decline of 470.34 points, or 0.78%, to close at 59,514 points, losing over 2,000 points from last week's close of 61,821 points.
The Singapore index fell 5.41 points, or 0.17%, to 3,209, the same level as last week’s close.
- European markets
Almost all major European indices were in negative territory at midday on the last transaction day of the week.
The STOXX Europe 600, which includes around 90% of the market capitalization of the European market in 17 countries, was down by 2.15 points, or 0.45%, to 473 as of 0947GMT.
London's FTSE 100 fell 18.64 points, or 0.26%, to 7,230 points, and Germany's DAX index was at 15,566 points, down 130 points or 0.83%.
The French CAC 40 lost 22 points, or 0.32%, to 6,782 points, while Italy's FTSE MIB posted a decline of 118.5 points, or 0.44%, to 26,771 points.
Only Spain's IBEX 35 rose 1.4 points, or 0.02%, to 9,027 points.