Renesas fire drags shares of Japan’s big three car maker

Toyota Motor, Nissan Motor, and Honda Motor had seen their shares drop on Monday. The decline monitored by Japan’s three biggest automakers was mainly from a fire at one of Renesas Electronics semiconductor plant, raising concerns that this might lead to a global shortage of automotive chips.

Shares of Japan’s big three carmakers traded 2% lower during their early session. The performance came sharper than the 1.4% drop made by the benchmark Topix index on the Tokyo bourse.

Renesas said that its production at Naka plant in northeast Japan will resume after at least a month. The fire breakout was from faulty electrical wirings, which destroyed machinery and fanned out smoke into the plant’s sensitive cleanroom.

Shipments’ choppy activity is expected to start in a month as large portions at the affected line are for the production of automotive chips.