Japanese Market Significantly Lower

(RTTNews) - The Japanese market is trading significantly lower on Friday, extending the losses in the previous two sessions, following the mixed cues from Wall Street overnight. The Nikkei 225 is falling below the 68,300 level, with weakness in index heavyweights, technology and financial stocks.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 Index is down 751.56 points or 1.09 percent to 68,290.55, after hitting a low of 68,150.02 earlier. Japanese shares ended sharply lower on Thursday.

Market heavyweight SoftBank Group is declining more than 5 percent and Uniqlo operator Fast Retailing is losing almost 3 percent. Among automakers, Toyota is flat and Honda is gaining more than 1 percent.

In the tech space, Advantest is losing almost 2 percent and Tokyo Electron is down almost 1 percent, while Screen Holdings is edging up 0.4 percent.

In the banking sector, Sumitomo Mitsui Financial and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial are losing almost 1 percent each, while Mizuho Financial is declining more than 2 percent.

Among the major exporters, Mitsubishi Electric is edging down 0.1 percent and Panasonic is losing almost 3 percent, while Sony is gaining almost 2 percent and Canon is adding almost 1 percent.

Among other major losers, Furukawa Electric slipping almost 5 percent, while Murata Manufacturing, Renesas Electronics, Kioxia Holdings and Sumco are declining more than 4 percent each. Asahi Kasei, Socionext, Mitsui Kinzoku and Fujikura are losing more than 3 percent each, while Sumitomo Electric Industries, Mitsui Chemicals, Terumo and Ibiden are down almost 3 percent each.

Conversely, Nomura Research Institute is jumping almost 5 percent, Trend Micro is surging more than 4 percent and BayCurrent is gaining almost 4 percent, while SHIFT, Japan Tobacco, Nitto Denko and Recruit Holdings are advancing more than 3 percent each. Nintendo, Kawasaki Kisen Kaisha and M3 are adding almost 3 percent each.

In economic news, Japan's household spending fell 3.1 percent on year in August 2026, easing from July's decline and beating market expectations of a 3.6 percent drop. However, it marked the ninth straight month of decline.

On a seasonally adjusted monthly basis, household spending edged up 0.1 percent, extending its gains for a second consecutive month but slowing sharply from July and falling short of estimates for a 0.5 percent increase.

In the currency market, the U.S. dollar is trading in the higher 157 yen-range on Friday.

On Wall Street, stocks moved mostly lower during trading on Thursday, adding to the modest losses posted in the previous session. The tech-heavy Nasdaq showed a notable move to the downside, pulling back further off the record closing high set on Tuesday.

The Nasdaq ended the day off its lows of the session but still slumped 345.35 points or 1.3 percent to 27,193.34. The S&P 500 also fell 36.41 points or 0.5 percent to 7,765.36, although the narrower Dow bucked the downtrend and inched up 51.77 points or 0.1 percent to 51,231.64.

Meanwhile, the major European markets moved to the downside on the day. While the German DAX Index slumped by 1.2 percent, the French CAC 40 Index fell by 0.5 percent and the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index dipped by 0.2 percent.

Crude oil price gave back some ground in mid-day trading moved back to the upside since then. West Texas Intermediate crude for November delivery was up by $3.65 or 4.1 percent at $91.93 a barrel after spiking by as much as $4.92 or 5.6 percent to a high of $93.20 a barrel.