According to Kabutan, The Korea Herald and HKET, Tokyo's Nikkei 225 opened Thursday at 64,539.36, down 81.88 points, while the broader TOPIX opened at 4,047.39, up 3.66 points. Uncertainty over the Middle East and concerns about excessive investment in artificial intelligence weighed at the open, while gains in major U.S. indexes in the previous session provided support, and the Nikkei briefly turned higher after the open. Resonac and Furukawa Electric declined, while Taiyo Yuden and NEC advanced. Overseas investors were net sellers of Japanese stocks for the first time in three weeks in the week of Oct. 11-17, selling 66.5 billion yen.

Seoul's KOSPI opened at 5,670.11, down 65.55 points, or 1.14%, before paring losses to 5,710.98 as of 9:15 a.m. Seoul time, down 24.68 points, or 0.46%. Samsung Electronics edged up 0.34%, SK hynix fell 0.31%, LG Energy Solution declined 3.65% and Samsung Electro-Mechanics gained 4.79%. The Bank of Korea (BOK) kept its benchmark interest rate unchanged at 3% after two consecutive rate hikes. The won traded at 1,326.5 per U.S. dollar.

Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index opened 138 points lower at 23,513, and the Hang Seng TECH Index fell 1.1% to 3,949. Lenovo fell 4%, Tencent dropped more than 1%, Alibaba lost 2% and CATL declined more than 3%. The Hang Seng's loss widened to 300 points after the open, with Alibaba down 3%.

Taiwan's TAIEX opened 54.98 points higher at 46,942.75 and later rose by nearly 450 points at one point. TSMC gained NT$15 to NT$2,435, while Elite Material rose by its daily limit.

In mainland China, the four major A-share indexes opened mixed: the Shanghai Composite rose 0.04%, the Shenzhen Component fell 0.12%, the ChiNext Index slipped 0.25% and the STAR Composite Index edged up 0.24%.