SYDNEY : Asian shares were down for a sixth straight session on Tuesday after a renewed spike in European energy prices stoked fears of recession and pushed bond yields higher, while tipping the euro to 20-year lows.
European and British manufacturing surveys due later on Tuesday were expected to highlight the damage being done to activity, with Germany seen deeper in contractionary territory. In Asia, unease over China's economy continued to percolate as a cut in lending rates and talk of a fresh round of official loans to property developers underlined stresses in the sector.
Chinese blue chips were off 0.2 per cent having received only a fleeting lift from the latest policy easing.MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan dipped 0.4 per cent, and has fallen every day in the past week. Ten-year yields were last trading at 3.029 per cent, up 50 basis points from the lows of early August.