The Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET) Index dropped 0.95 per cent, or 17.04 points, to 1,765.24 at the close, with a trading value of Bt62.1 billion.

The decline came despite 487 companies listed on the SET and the exchange’s junior board, the Market for Alternative Investment, having announced they would pay out a total of Bt478.09 billion in dividends based on their financial results for 2017.

The baht rose to Bt31.179 per US dollar at the close of trading, up Bt0.036 from Bt31.215 on Monday.

Elsewhere in Asia, Singapore, Straits Times Index dropped 18.61 points to close at 3,412.15.

Tokyo stocks ended lower, with the benchmark Nikkei 225 Index slipping 0.45 per cent, or 96.29 points, to 21,292.29. The broader Topix index shed 0.29 per cent, or 4.98 points, to 1,703.8.

Shares in the key market opened sharply lower following the drops in US stocks as worries about a US-China trade war intensified, noted Makoto Sengoku, a market analyst at Tokai Tokyo Research Institute. But they trimmed early losses in afternoon trade.

“The impact from the US market turned out not to be so bad as to incite terror here, thanks to lingering hopes that tensions may ease in the weeks to come,” Sengoku said.

The yen’s strengthening also eased while drops on other Asian markets were limited, he told Agence France-Presse.

The plunge on Wall Street was driven by weakness in technology shares, sparking a broader sell-off amid rising fears of a trade war.

These anxieties were back in focus on Monday after China slapped retaliatory tariffs on 128 US exports, including 25 per cent on pork products and recycled aluminium.

The tech-sector slump dented sentiment by clouding the long-term prospects of some of the market’s biggest stars.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 1.9 per cent to 23,644.19 points, while the broad-based S&P 500 Index shed 2.2 per cent to 2,581.88 points.

After US stocks surged to repeat records in January on euphoria over President Donald Trump’s tax cut, Wall Street has been buffeted by a series of worries over the prospect of higher inflation spurring the Federal Reserve to accelerate interest rate rises and the risk that Trump’s harsh trade policies could ignite a global trade war.

In addition to China’s move on the 128 US exports – which Beijing had telegraphed in retaliation for US tariffs targeting China – Trump again threatened to spike the North American Free Trade Agreement. He said on Twitter that Mexico was doing too little to counter illegal immigration into the United States.

Bucking the trend, Hong Kong stocks ended higher yesterday after rallying from a slide in early trading on the US-China trade tensions.