Japanese Market Significantly Lower

(RTTNews) - The Japanese stock market is significantly lower on Thursday, giving up some of the gains in the previous two sessions, with the Nikkei 225 floating just above the 26,500 level, following the broadly negative cues from Wall Street overnight, with weakness across most sectors, led by financial and technology stocks. Traders also digested domestic data that showed another trade deficit in December as import growth outpaced export growth.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 Index is up 274.53 points or 1.02 percent to 26,516.59, after hitting a low of 26,456.52 earlier. Japanese stocks closed sharply higher on Wednesday.

Market heavyweight SoftBank Group is losing more than 3 percent and Uniqlo operator Fast Retailing is down more than 1 percent. Among automakers, Toyota is losing more than 2 percent and Honda is declining almost 2 percent.

In the tech space, Screen Holdings is losing more than 1 percent and Tokyo Electron is declining almost 2 percent, while Advantest is edging up 0.2 percent.

In the banking sector, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial and Mizuho Financial are edging down 0.5 percent each, while Sumitomo Mitsui Financial is losing more than 1 percent.

Among the major exporters, Mitsubishi Electric is losing almost 1 percent and Canon is edging down 0.3 percent each, while Panasonic is edging up 0.1 percent and Sony is gaining almost 1 percent.

Among the other major losers, Mitsubishi Motors is losing more than 5.5 percent and Mazda Motor is down more than 4 percent, while Nissan Motor, Suzuki Motor, Fujikura, Olympus and Subaru are declining more than 3 percent each. TDK and Tokyu Fudosan Holdings are slipping almost 3 percent each.

Conversely, there are no other major gainers.

In the currency market, the U.S. dollar is trading in the lower 128 yen-range on Thursday.

On Wall Street, stocks saw initial strength during trading on Wednesday but moved sharply lower over the course of the session. The major averages all showed notable moves to the downside after ending Tuesday's trading mixed.

The major averages fell to new lows for the session going into the close of trading. The Dow plunged 613.89 points or 01.8 percent to 33,296.96, the Nasdaq slumped 138.10 points or 1.2 percent to 10,957.01 and the S&P 500 tumbled 62.11 points or 1.6 percent to 3,928.86.

Meanwhile, the major European markets turned in a mixed performance on the day. While the French CAC 40 Index inched up by 0.1 percent, the German DAX Index closed just below the unchanged line and the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index dipped by 0.3 percent.

Crude oil futures settled lower on Wednesday amid concerns about a possible U.S. recession. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for February ended lower by $0.70 or 0.9 percent at $79.48 a barrel.