TOKYO
(dpa-AFX) - The Japanese stock market is down with sharp losses on Tuesday, following the weak cues overnight from Wall Street and European markets. Additionally, a stronger yen dragged down exporters' stocks.
In late-morning trades, the benchmark Nikkei 225 Index is losing 722.17 points or 4.25 percent to 16,282.13, off a low of 16,220.53 in early trades.
Among the major exporters, Sony and Panasonic are down more than 5 percent, while Hitachi is declining almost 3 percent. Also, Casio Computer is lower by more than 2 percent, Canon is down almost 4 percent and Toshiba is falling more than 4 percent.
The Nikkei business daily reported that Daikin Industries plans to acquire
U.S.
-based air filtration company Flanders for about
50 billion yen. However, shares of the company are down more than 4 percent.
In the banking space, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial is lower by 7 percent and Resona Holdings is declining more than 6 percent amid worries about their profitability after the Bank of Japan adopted negative interest rates in January.
Oil stock Inpex is declining 4 percent and JX Holdings is losing almost 4 percent.
Among the other major losers, Sumco Corp is down 10 percent, Nomura Holdings is lower by more than 9 percent and Asahi Glass is losing almost 9 percent.
On the economic front, the Bank of Japan said that the M2 money stock in
Japan
was up 3.2 percent on year in January, worth
923.7 trillion yen. That topped forecasts for an increase of 0.3 percent following the 0.1 percent gain in December.
The M3 money stock added an annual 2.5 percent to 1,242.0 trillion yen - unchanged and in line with expectations.
Japan
will also release preliminary January figures for machine tool orders later in the day.
In the currency market, the
U.S.
dollar traded in the upper
115 yen-level on Tuesday, down from Monday's close in the lower
117 yen-range in
Tokyo
.
On Wall Street, stocks climbed well off their worst levels in late trading on Monday, but still closed firmly in the red. The sell-off was partly due to a decline in the price of crude oil, which also reflected concerns about the outlook for the global economy.
The Dow dropped 177.2 points or 1.1 percent to 16,027.05, the Nasdaq tumbled 79.39 points or 1.8 percent to 4,283.75 and the S&P 500 slumped 26.61 points or 1.4 percent to 1,853.44.
The major European markets showed substantial moves to the downside on Monday. While the
U.K.'s
FTSE 100 Index slumped by 2.7 percent, the French CAC 40 Index and the German DAX Index plummeted by 3.2 percent and 3.3 percent, respectively.
Crude oil prices tumbled Monday amid lingering doubts about the health of the global economy. Crude for March delivery slumped $1.20 or 3.88 percent to close at $29.69 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
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