TOKYO SHARES INCH LOWER FROM EXPORTERS’ PRESSURE OVER FIRMER YEN

TOKYO-Japanese stock benchmark Nikkei underperformed on Tuesday brought heavily by ambiguity in US-China trade negotiations and exporters’ anxiety from yen’s performance against dollar.  

The Nikkei share plunged down with 0.2% to 23,361.35 as broader Topix dropped with 0.1% to 1,698.44.

Wall Street’s primary indexes started flat-lined from lack of trade direction. However, it managed to soar up to record high closing levels before closing its session.

Beijing’s mood was pessimistic overnight as there is still no concrete progress on the possibility of phase-one signing with Washington.

However, a latest memorandum allowing US companies to continue transactions with Chinese Telecoms giant Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. lessen the growing market anxiety.

Japanese yen outperformed dollar early on Tuesday as it recorded a 0.2% increase to 108.47. In line, exporters laid off bets as the local currency will inflict corporate earnings once they are repatriated.

Export-heavy Fanuc Corp lost 1.0% while Toyota Motor Corp sunk down with 0.7% loss and Sony Corp with 1.3% setback.

Semiconductor shares inched lower as profit-taking selling started with SUMCO Corp losing 2.3% and Disco Corp shedding 0.5%.

Nikkei’s heavyweight SoftBank Group Corp plummeted with 1.4% following reports that New York State Attorney General put WeWork under investigation. SoftBank Group owns the office-sharing startup.

Mitsubishi Chemical Holdings Corp edged down with 3.5% after it released its plan of buying Mitsubishi Tanabe Pharma Corp with 491.8 billion yen to make it a fully-owned subsidiary. The latter company’s shares remain untraded despite the presence of buy orders.