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· Asian stocks tumbled to a one-month low on Thursday as already-growing market fears about global growth were fanned by the United State announcement of new import tariffs on products from the European Union.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan .MIAPJ0000PUS dropped 0.60%. Japan's Nikkei stock index .N225closed down 2.00%, the biggest one-day decline since Aug. 26.Australian shares slumped 2.07% to a five-week low.

The pan-region Euro Stoxx 50 futures were down 0.38%, while FTSE futures were off 0.34%.

U.S. stock futures were up 0.22%, but this did little to bolster sentiment after shares on Wall Street suffered their sharpest one-day decline in nearly six weeks on Wednesday, when the three major New York share indexes all lost more than 1.5%.

The U.S.-China trade war has cast a shadow over global growth prospects and on Wednesday there was an escalation of the trade dispute between Washington and the EU as President Donald Trump’s administration announced it would impose tariffs on $7.5 billion of goods.

Washington will enact 10% tariffs on Airbus (AIR.PA) planes and 25%duties on French wine, Scotch and Irish whiskies and cheese from across the continent as punishment for illegal EU aircraft subsidies.

· Japanese shares took a battering on Thursday, with the benchmark Nikkei falling 2%, after a private sector jobs report in the United States offered fresh evidence that the trade war with China is taking a toll on the economy.

Compounding investor anxiety, Washington opened a new front in its trade war with Europe, driving the Nikkei share average down 2.0% to21,341.74, its lowest closing since September 9. The broader Topix lost1.7% to 1,568.87, also more than a three-week low.

On Wednesday, data showed hiring by U.S. private employers had cooled in September, another worrying signal after a report on Tuesday showing U.S. September factory activity contracted by the most in more than a decade.

Nikkei heavyweight Fast Retailing slumped 3.9% after the company said its same-store sales fell 4.2% in September from a year earlier.

· European stocks were mixed Thursday morning after the U.S. announced it would impose billions of dollars’ worth of tariffs on exports from the European Union.

The pan-European Stoxx 600 hovered just below the flatline, with oil and gas stocks shedding 1% to lead losses while the food and beverage sector climbed 0.6%.

Reference: Reuters, CNBC