Asia-Pacific markets were mostly flat on Friday against an also muted Wall Street looking to revive its recent market rally.
It was largely negative territory for mainland China markets. The Shanghai Composite fell 0.59% to 3,258.08 while the Shenzhen Component dipped 1.27% to 12,358.54.
The Hang Seng index closed flat. There was positive action from Tencent, up 0.77% but food delivery giant, Meituan was down more than 0.7%. This week, Tencent denied offloading its stake in Meituan.
After Tencent's second quarter revenue slide earlier this week, fellow tech giant NetEase offered the markets a sweetener posting a nearly 13% year-on-year increase in its second quarter net revenue, beating expectations. But its share price finished more than 6% lower.
Japan's Nikkei 225 also finished flat at 28,930.33 while the Topix index added 0.2% to 1994.52. The Kospi was down at 0.61% at close.
Japan's July headline inflation has risen to 2.6% from 2.4% in June. That was above expectations of 2.2% and higher than the Bank of Japan's goal of 2.0%.
Compared to a lackluster start to the week, Japanese stocks were buoyant. Nissan rose 1.3% while Nikon Corp was trading higher by over 3%. Sony and Olympus were also ahead by between 2%.
The S&P/ASX 200 in Australia also ended flat at 7,114.50.
India's central bank is due to release minutes of its last monetary policy statement later on Friday.