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  Date / Time: 3/6/2009 7:22 PM UTC

  Asian shares fall on concerns over banks
  

  sian stocks fell, dragging the regional benchmark index to a fourth weekly decline, on renewed concern losses at financial institutions will mount as the global recession deepens.

   

  Bloomberg
  Last Updated: 10:00AM GMT 06 Mar 2009

  HSBC, Europe’s largest bank, sank 1.9pc after CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets cut its share-price target and Citigroup’s stock fell below $1 for the first time.

  BHP Billiton dropped 2.9pc in Sydney after oil and metals prices retreated. Honda, which gets more than half its sales from North America, lost 4.9pc after the Japanese currency rose against the dollar.

  “People haven’t yet understood the full depth of the financial crisis,” said Yoshinori Nagano, a senior strategist at Daiwa Asset Management Co., which oversees about $96 billion of assets. “Should regulators assess banks’ assets under stricter conditions, quite a few of these companies may be effectively insolvent.”

  The MSCI Asia Pacific Index dropped 1.6pc to 71.97 as of 3:24 p.m. in Tokyo, following a two-day, 1.8pc gain.

  The gauge lost 4.3pc this week, taking declines in the past year to 50pc, as the global recession pummeled profits at companies from BHP to Toyota, the world’s largest automaker.

  Japan’s Nikkei 225 Stock Average slumped 3.5pc to 7,173.10. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index lost 1.3pc, while Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 Index fell 1.4pc. All Asian markets declined except Taiwan, India and Sri Lanka.

  Futures on the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index lost 0.3pc. The US gauge slid 4.3pc yesterday to the lowest close since September 1996, led by financial companies. Shares of Citigroup, once the world’s biggest bank by value, tumbled to 97 cents before closing at $1.02, bringing this year’s decline to 85pc.

  “Citi below $1 shows we are still far from the exit of this US-originated global financial crisis,” Kiyoshi Ishigane, a senior strategist at Tokyo-based Mitsubishi UFJ Asset Management, which oversees about $61bn, said in an interview with Bloomberg Television

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