Japanese Market Sharply Lower

(RTTNews) - The Japanese stock market is sharply lower on Thursday, giving up the gains in the previous two sessions, with the benchmark Nikkei 225 staying above the 28,800 level, following the broadly negative cues overnight from Wall Street, as traders digested the U.S. Fed's monetary policy minutes, which indicated the US Fed is preparing to begin reducing the size of its balance sheet soon after raising interest rates.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 Index is losing 521.47 points or 1.78 percent to 28,810.69, after hitting a low of 28,806.10 earlier. Japanese shares ended slightly higher on Wednesday.

Market heavyweight SoftBank Group is losing 1.4 percent, while Uniqlo operator Fast Retailing is declining almost 3 percent. Among automakers, Toyota is adding more than 1 percent and Honda is edging up 0.3 percent.

In the tech space, Advantest is losing more than 2 percent, Screen Holdings is declining 3.5 percent and Tokyo Electron is down almost 2 percent.

In the banking sector, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial is edging down 0.2 percent, while Sumitomo Mitsui Financial and Mizuho Financial are flat.

The major exporters are lower. Sony is declining 6.5 percent, Mitsubishi Electric is losing almost 1 percent and Canon is edging down 0.4 percent. Panasonic is flat.

Among the other major losers, Terumo is losing more than 7 percent and M3 is slipping more than 6 percent, while Taiyo Yuden and Fuji Electric are declining more than 4 percent each. Keisei Electric Railway is down almost 4 percent.

Conversely, Shionogi & Co. is gaining almost 3 percent and Shinsei Bank is adding more than 2 percent.