Thai stocks slid another 1.4% on Friday, the most in Asia, as a delay in voting on the government's amnesty bill spurred concerns of more protests.
The Stock Exchange of Thailand Index declined 20.20 points from Thursday to close at 1,405.03, a decrease of 1.7% from the previous Friday's close. Turnover was 36.8 billion baht, with 6.94 billion shares traded.
The local market is up 1% from the end of 2012 and down 14.5% from the year-high of 1,643.34 reached in mid-May.
"Prolonged political unrest will hurt the economy that’s already weak, and with the current mood foreigners probably don't want to put money in Thailand," said Tohru Nishihama, an economist covering emerging markets at Dai-ichi Life Research Institute in Tokyo. "The political situation will weigh on the baht, which may underperform its regional peers."
The baht was trading late Friday in Bangkok at 31.38.42 to the dollar, compared with 31.25/30 on Thursday, and 31.19/21 a week earlier.
On the SET, foreign investors were net sellers on Friday of 567 million baht worth of Thai shares, bringing their net sales for the month to 6.96 billion baht. For the year to date they are net sellers of 112.2 billion baht.
Local institutions were net buyers of 357.3 million baht and brokers bought 371.9 million. Individual investors were net sellers of 161.7 million baht.
Global stocks were mostly lower on Friday on investor uncertainty ahead of new US jobs data later in the day and an important economic planning meeting in China on the weekend.
In early European trading, Britain's FTSE 100 slipped 0.5%, Germany's DAX fell 0.6% and France's CAC 40 slid 0.8%. US stocks were poised to bounce higher. Dow futures edged up 0.1% to 15,581 and S&P 500 futures rose 0.2% to 1,748.80.
Asian stocks followed Wall Street lower after data that showed the US economy grew by 2.8% in the third quarter, nearly a percentage point faster than economists had predicted. That led many investors to believe the Federal Reserve would start pulling back its bond buying programme, with some predicting it could happen as early as December.
Japan's Nikkei 225 sank 1% to end at 14,086.80 and Seoul's Kospi dropped 1% to 1,984.87. Hong Kong's Hang Seng slid 0.6% to 22,744.39 and the Shanghai Composite fell 1.1% to 2,106.13.
In Bangkok, the SET50 index of blue chips ended at 960.68 points, down 15.29 points, with total trade value of 27.6 billion baht. The SETHD index of high-dividend shares declined 12.62 points to 1,139.93, with turnover of 11.4 billion baht. The Market for Alternative Investment lost 6.12 points to 372.90, with transaction value of 836.3 million baht.
Telecom stocks accounted for four of the five most actively traded shares by value, with ADVANC falling 8 baht to close at 228; INTUCH down 2.50 baht to 77.50, JAS off 25 satang to 7.95 baht, TRUE down 35 satang to 8.10 baht, and SCB unchanged at 166.50 baht.