Most Asian Stocks Fall, Led by Commodity Producers; BHP Drops

By Kyung Bok Cho

Nov. 19 (Bloomberg) -- Most Asian stocks fell, led by commodity producers and financial companies, as oil, gold and aluminum prices dropped and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc. posted its lowest quarterly profit in at least four years.

Woodside Petroleum Ltd., Australia's second-largest oil company, lost 6.3 percent after crude fell to the lowest since January 2007. Mitsubishi UFJ, Japan's biggest bank, declined 3.1 percent. Babcock & Brown Ltd., the worst performing stock on the MSCI Pacific Index this year, plunged 19 percent in Sydney after saying it will accelerate jobs cuts to avoid defaulting on debt.

The MSCI Asia Pacific Index fell 0.3 percent to 76.69 at 9:59 a.m. in Tokyo. About two stocks dropped for each the rose.

Shares on the MSCI gauge are valued at 9.9 times trailing earnings and fell to 8.2 times last month, the lowest level since at least 1995, Bloomberg data shows. The index has lost 49 percent this year as financial institutions' losses and writedowns from the collapse of the U.S. mortgage market approach $1 trillion and companies cut more than 166,000 jobs.

Japan's Nikkei 225 Stock Average lost 0.7 percent to 8,270.69. All other Asian benchmark indexes declined.

According to Bloomberg data, 51 percent of shares on the gauge traded at below their book value, with a quarter of Asian shares priced at less than half of their net worth.

Futures on the U.S. Standard & Poor's 500 Index slipped 1.1 percent. The S&P 500 advanced 1 percent yesterday, gaining in the last hour of trading as energy and technology shares rallied.

Woodside declined 6.3 percent to A$32.79. BHP Billiton Ltd., the world's biggest mining company and Australia's largest oil producer, slipped 2.4 percent to A$23.62.

Crude oil fell 1 percent to $54.39 a barrel yesterday in New York. Gold fell for the second day, losing 1.3 percent to $732.70 an ounce, while aluminum fell to a three-year low in London.

To contact the reporter for this story: Kyung Bok Cho in Seoul at kcho7@bloomberg.net;