By Chris Oliver, MarketWatch HONG KONG (MarketWatch) -- Asian stocks closed mainly lower Wednesday, with Shanghai's Composite surging 6.1% to lead regional gainers, as investors chased Sinopec shares higher on hopes that a new gasoline tax under consideration could herald market-based pricing for fuels. Among other regional indexes, the Philippines managed to buck the bearish trend along with Shanghai. Most declining markets pared back early losses in late dealings, however, although the mood remained fairly downbeat as investors weighted evidence of further economic slowing. Shares of Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group ended 6.4% lower in Tokyo. The bank, Japan's largest, reported a 64% decline in first-half net income and said it would sell up to 1 billion shares in the next few months to strengthen its capital base. Japan's Nikkei 225 Average ended down 0.7% at 8,272.22. South Korea's Kospi also fell, down 1.9% to 1,016.82, and Australia's S&P/ASX 200 was off 0.7% at 3,499.60. Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index finished 0.8% lower at 12,815.80. Unemployment in the banking and shipping hub edged up to 3.5% in the three months ended in October, rising 0.1 of a percentage point from the third quarter, government data showed. Taiwan's Taiex was down 0.5% at 4,284.09. Singapore's Straits Times Index fell 1.6% to close at 1,665.59 and New Zealand's NZSX-50 gave up 0.3% to 2,706.28. Kuala Lumpur's Composite was down 0.6% to close at 877, Bangkok's SET fell 2.7% to 408, and Jakarta's Composite fell 0.8% to 1,180. India's Sensex surrendered earlier gains to end 1.8% lower at 8,773.78, and the Philippines Composite added 1.9% to 1,908.18. "People are looking at soft economic growth globally, recession talk is still going around, and we still see stimulus packages which are a bit slow to be implemented in Asia," said Jurg Kiener, head of advisory firm Swiss Asia Capital in Singapore. Added Patrick Bennett, a foreign-exchange strategist with SocGen in Hong Kong, in a research note Wednesday: "Reports of slower domestic economic activity are starting to permeate Asian headlines, replacing what has previously been a dominance of attention on the woes in the U.S. and more recently Europe." In currencies, the U.S. dollar changed hands at 96.80 Japanese yen, down from of 96.86 yen in late New York dealings Tuesday. Shanghai's about-face Asian stocks seemed to take few cues from a stronger session for stocks in New York on Tuesday, where expectations-beating results from Hewlett Packard and Home Depot helped lift the Dow Jones Industrial Average 1.8% higher to 8,424.75. Also Tuesday, the S&P 500 added 8.37 points to 859.12 and the Nasdaq Composite rose 1.22 points to 1,483.27.

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