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  • VARIOUS: Tokyo markets lead Asian shares down after slump on Wall Street

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VARIOUS: Tokyo markets lead Asian shares down after slump on Wall Street

Tokyo stocks down nearly 3 percent on Wall Street while Hong Kong shares slide 2.7 percent. Tokyo stocks fell nearly 3 percent on Wednesday (March 14) with a wide range of shares led by exporters such as Honda Motor Co. Ltd. hit by concerns about the U.S. outlook and a stronger yen. The fall followed Wall Street's second-worst sell-off of the year on Tuesday (March 13). The Nikkei fell 512.04 points to finish morning trade at its low of 16,666.80, about 134 points above the 2007 low hit earlier this month. It is also the benchmark's lowest level in over a week. The broad TOPIX index lost 2.87 percent to 1,675.88. "Obviously not an easy morning to be an investor in Tokyo. We finished the morning down a stunning 500 points, nearly three percent on the Nikkei which is a greater fall than the fall we saw in New York overnight. Obviously sentiment is battered; as one market participant told me there is not really much you can do when you come in and New York has fallen as much as it did last night. Obviously the hardest hit stocks are the ones most reliant on the US market," said Reuters equities reporter David Dolan in Tokyo. Japanese markets fell despite growing consumer confidence in Japan. "Japan is the world's second largest economy and it is rebounding and there is a lot more confidence in the domestic economic story now than there was before but none the less Japan is still part of the world economy and it relies on US consumer spending. If you look at companies like Toyota, Honda, so much of their market is in the US and also as well these are companies that are affected by swings in the yen. A strong yen means less profit when they bring their sales from the US back home," Dolan said. The dollar fell as low as 115.88 early in the Tokyo session, extending losses after falling more than 1 percent on Tuesday and edging towards a three-month low of 115.16 yen touched earlier in March.

ITN Source | March 14, 2007Watch more videos from ITN Source

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