News: XFJ Australia shares slide as caution reigns, NZ fall most in 4 weeks

Australian shares fell on Friday, on track to snap three straight days of gains, as investors grew cautious about upcoming earnings and the impact of a stronger currency as well as second quarter U.S. economic growth data.

The S&P/ASX 200 index (xjo) fell 1.4 percent, or 83.01 points to 5,702.4 by 0330 GMT, on track to shed 0.4 percent for the week. The benchmark closed up 0.15 percent on Thursday.

Oil prices edged away from 8-week highs on Friday after five straight days of gains. [O/R]

Markets are focused on second quarter U.S. gross domestic product data due later in the day for clues on the strength of the U.S. economy. Economists expect the data to show U.S. growth picking up to 2.6 percent from 1.4 percent in the January-March quarter.

Financial and material stocks led Friday's losses. "Knowing how energy has been over the recent past, I think any time where investors are unable to liquidate positions at call creates a situation where they may want to keep risk off at the moment," said Kurt Mayell, Asian equity hedge analyst at CMC Markets Asia Pacific Pty Ltd.

"We do have several high impact data points due out tonight including U.S. GDP data, so traders locally are happy to keep some risk off leading into the weekend."

Adam Tout, a senior analyst at CPS Capital in Perth, said the sell-off could also be due to caution ahead of next week's earnings season, as well as a stronger Australian dollar.

The Aussie dollar has advanced strongly as its U.S. counterpart floundered through most of this week, soaring to a 26-month high on Thursday. It was up 0.7 percent for the week.

The financial index .AXFJ fell as much as 2 percent, posting its biggest intraday percentage loss in over five weeks, with the 'Big Four' banks losing between 1.6 percent and 2.2 percent.

ANZ (ANZ), Westpac Banking (WBC) and National Australia Bank (NAB) all slid to over one-week lows.

Miners BHP Billiton (BHP) and Rio Tinto (RIO) both slipped as much as 1.8 percent, as iron ore prices dropped.

China's steel rebar futures eased after three days of gains due to underlying concerns about a weak demand outlook amid increasing output at mills. [IRONORE/]

New Zealand's benchmark S&P/NZX 50 index (nz50) fell 0.9 percent, or 67.32 points to 7,644.49 as of 0330 GMT, and down 0.3 percent for the week.

The index posted its biggest intraday percentage drop in four weeks, with losses spread across all sectors.