In today's market report... Asian markets tumbled in early trade, with falls triggered by a surprise rate hike in China.

Property stocks led falls in Shanghai and Hong Kong.

Vanke, China's largest listed property developer, fell as much as 9.5 percent.

The Shanghai property sub-index was down 3.7 percent in early afternoon trading.

But the Shanghai benchmark turned around early losses by midday, with support from financial stocks. Banks rose on the prospect of improved margins from higher interest rates.

Seoul's KOSPI and Taiwan's TAIEX also rose, led by gains in technology stocks like Hynix, and HTC, and boosted by gains in Hyundai and Kia Motor.

The strong yen weighed further on Japan's exporters, amid a flight to safe-haven assets like the Japanese currency, and the dollar.

Trading houses, miners and energy stocks fell, after oil, gold and base metals posted their biggest losses in months on the firmer dollar.

Petrochina and China Shenhua were the biggest losers in Hong Kong, while Australian oil producers Woodside and Santos fell alongside weakness in BHP and Rio Tinto.