Japan Market extends losses to third day

Japan share market finished session lower on Friday, 01 April 2022, extending the losses in the previous two days, as risk aversion selloff continued on tracking negative lead from Wall Street overnight and concerns about the continuing conflict in Ukraine.

Denting sentiment further, the nation's business confidence worsened for the first time in nearly two years in the first quarter as companies were hit by supply disruptions and surging raw material costs caused by the Ukraine crisis.

At closing bell, the 225-issue Nikkei Stock Average declined 155.45 points, or 0.56%, to 27,665.98. The broader Topix index of all First Section issues on the Tokyo Stock Exchange dropped 2.13 points, or 0.11%, to 1,944.27.

Chip-related shares dragged the Nikkei index lower on Friday, with Tokyo Electron losing 2.48% and Advantest falling 1.76%. Uniqlo clothing shop operator Fast Retailing fell 1.14%.

Market heavyweight SoftBank Group lost almost 1% and Uniqlo operator Fast Retailing fell almost 2%. Among automakers, Honda was down almost 2% and Toyota fell almost 1 .

Bucking the trend, Toshiba surged 6.5% after private equity firm Bain Capital sounded out multiple shareholders of Toshiba about a possible offer for the Japanese conglomerate.

ECONOMIC NEWS: Bank of Japan's quarterly Tankan Survey of business sentiment showed that diffusion index came score of +14 in the first quarter of 2022, down from +18 three months ago. The outlook came in at +9, down from +13 in the previous quarter. Large all industry capex was seen higher by 2.2 percent, down from 9.3 percent in the previous three months. The large non-manufacturers index came in at +9, unchanged from the previous month. The outlook was +7, which would have been unchanged.

CURRENCY NEWS: The Japanese yen traded at 122.73 per dollar, stronger than levels above 122 seen against the greenback yesterday.

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