Australian shares lost 1 percent on Friday, retreating from a near six-year high after a selloff on Wall Street hit market sentiment, while Coca-Cola Amatil Ltd sank to a 4-1/2 year low after the beverage firm issued a profit warning. The S&P/ASX 200 index dived 52.2 points to 5,428.6 by the close, but eked out a gain of 0.1 percent for the week, its fourth consecutive week of gains.
On Thursday, the benchmark had risen 0.3 percent and touched a session high of 5,503.5, its highest since June 2008. New Zealand's benchmark NZX 50 index fell 0.5 percent or 24.1 points to finish the session at 5,091.4.
Commonwealth Bank of Australia lost 0.8 percent and Westpac Banking Corp fell 0.7 percent. Index heavyweight miners BHP Billiton Ltd and Rio Tinto Ltd lost 0.6 percent and 1.1 percent, respectively.
"I think our clients are really shorting mining stocks at the moment, that seems to be how they seem to be playing the market," said Daniel Wypler, senior market maker at City Index in Sydney.
Wypler added that investors were taking a wait-and-see stance towards banks, eyeing macro data and the Reserve Bank of Australia's policy setting meetings over the next few months.
Coca-Cola Amatil dived 14.4 percent to A$9.76, its lowest since October 2009. The bottler said it expects its earnings to fall around 15 percent in the first half of 2014 because of weak spending in Australia and rising costs in Indonesia.
Some stocks bucked the downdraft on upbeat cues.
Echo Entertainment Group soared 11.8 percent to a one-month high of A$2.70 after the casino operator said stronger gaming revenue had boosted third-quarter earnings, and named a new chief executive.
Padbury Mining Ltd rocketed 75 percent to a three-year peak of A$0.04 after saying it had secured almost $6.5 billion in funding to build a new port and associated railway at Oakajee in Western Australia.
Elsewhere, trading in shares of Bank of Queensland Ltd was suspended after it said it would buy Investec Bank (Australia) Ltd's business finance and asset leasing unit for A$440 million.
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