Best commodities - IMF Outlook Hurt Asia Shares, Nuclear Worries : Asian shares fell Tuesday on selling prompted by Japan's declaring its nuclear crisis a match for the Chernobyl disaster in severity and after the International Monetary Fund said global economic growth should slow this year as new risks emerge.
Several materials-sector shares tumbled as prices of crude oil and some other resources pulled back after the IMF's reported its views at its annual
World Economic Outlook and Goldman Sachs withdrew bullish recommendations on some commodities.
The day's sell-off gathered pace after Japan raised the crisis level at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear-plant accident to the worst possible level on an international scale—the same level as the 1986 disaster at Chernobyl in Ukraine. More earthquake aftershocks during the day also rattled investors.
"The headline news makes foreign investors think that the crisis is serious enough to encompass the Tokyo area," said Kenichi Hirano, an operating officer at Tachibana Securities.
Japan's Nikkei Stock Average skidded 1.7% to 9555.26, Australia's S&P/ASX 200 dropped 1.5% to 4898.7 and South Korea's Kospi slid 1.6% to 2089.40. Taiwan's Taiex gave up 1.7% to 8732.59, Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index shed 1.3% to 23976.37 and China's Shanghai Composite slipped 0.1% to 3021.37.
The Indian market was closed for a public holiday.Dow Jones Industrial Average futures were off 52 points in electronic trading.
Some analysts remained positive on Japanese stocks for their appeal beyond the immediate crisis.
"The trades in the market from a fundamental and technical point tell you to sell, at least in the short term," said Ben Collett, head of Japanese equities at Louis Capital Markets.
However, "I think you've got to trade the longer-term macro picture [and] buy the weakness now on the assumption that [it] will reward you by the end of the year."
Mr.Collett added that the Japanese market's underperformance this year—in relation to other global markets—likely made it a better bet now than the U.S. markets.
A stronger yen and lingering worries over disruption to production sent most exporters lower, with Toyota Motor losing 0.6% and Sony falling 2.9%.
Shares of Tokyo Electric Power, the operator of the stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant, erased early gains on the elevated nuclear risk level and finished down 10%.
Several energy and commodity stocks sank after analysts at Goldman Sachs said that the runup in prices over the past several months meant the potential reward for being long on commodities such as crude oil, copper and platinum no longer justified the risk.
Inpex tumbled 5.2% in Tokyo, Woodside Petroleum fell 2.8% and Platinum Australia fell 4.4% in Sydney, while PetroChina. skidded 4.9% and Jiangxi Copper lost 3% in Hong Kong.
In commodities trade, May Nymex crude-oil futures dropped 47 cents to $109.45 a barrel on Globex. Spot gold was at $1,460.50 a troy ounce, giving up $2.70 from its New York settlement on Monday.
Aluminum-related companies were also pressured after aluminum giant Alcoa reported disappointing quarterly sales figures on Monday. Alumina tumbled 6% in Sydney, while Aluminum Corp. of China—Chinalco—fell 1.8% and United Co. Rusal slipped 0.5% in Hong Kong.
Banks fell in Hong Kong. The city's monetary authority on Monday said it will step up its vigilance against "unsustainable" credit growth, and Barclays Capital downgraded some lenders, citing the risk of a "potential liquidity squeeze." BOC Hong Kong Holdings and Hang Seng Bank, two of the stocks downgraded by Barclays, fell 2.4% and 2.2%, respectively.
In Seoul, foreign investors snapped their 18-session buying spree. Among major stocks, Samsung Electronics fell 1.3% and Hyundai Motor shed 2.9%. The Bank of Korea Tuesday kept its benchmark policy rate steady at 3%, as predicted. But the central bank is widely expected to increase borrowing costs as early as next month, given the economy's solid growth momentum and upward price pressures.
In other markets, Singapore's Straits Times Index, Indonesian shares and Philippine stocks each gave up 0.7% and New Zealand's NZX 50 eased 0.3%. But Thailand's SET was going its own way, gaining 0.8%.
In foreign-exchange trade, the fresh worries surrounding Japan's nuclear crisis kept risk-sensitive currencies such as the euro and the Australian dollar pressured for most of the session.
Recently, the U.S. dollar was at 83.31 yen, from ¥84.61 in late New York trade on Monday. The euro, which fell as low as $1.4376 earlier in the Asian day, was recently fetching $1.4473 from $1.4437; it slipped against the Japanese currency to ¥121.89, from ¥122.15. The Australian dollar dropped to US$1.0487, from US$1.0506 earlier in the session.
Teppei Ino, a senior analyst at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ, said the upgrade of the Fukushima accident to Chernobyl-like proportions prompted traders to unwind yen-short positions.
Lead Japanese government bond futures were down 0.05 at 138.62 points, while the yield on the 10-year cash JGB was up 0.01 percentage point at 1.330%.
