Japan Nikkei falls ahead of US inflation data

Japan stock market finished session modestly lower on Wednesday, 10 April 2024, giving up some of the gains in the previous two sessions, as investors opted to book profit on following the mixed cues from Wall Street overnight and caution ahead of the release of key U.S. inflation readings and the minutes of Fed's March policy meeting.

The 225-issue Nikkei Stock Average index declined 191.32 points, or 0.48%, to finish at 39,581.81. The broader Topix index of all First Section issues on the Tokyo Stock Exchange dropped 11.90 points, 0.43%, to 2,742.79.

Total 21 of 33 TSE sectors closed lower, with Insurance sector was bottom performer, down 1.74%, followed by Pharmaceutical (down 1.23%), Wholesale Trade (down 1.09%), and Machinery (down 1.02%), and Securities & Commodities Futures (down 1%) sectors, while Electric Power & Gas sector was top performer, rising 2.68%, followed by Nonferrous Metals (up 0.95%) sector.

Shares of export related companies were mixed, with Toyota falling 1.2% and Honda erasing 1.3%. Fast Retailing lost 1.7%.

ECONOMIC NEWS: Japan's producer prices were up 0.2% on month in March, unchanged from the February reading, the Bank of Japan or BoJ said on Wednesday. On a yearly basis, producer prices rose 0.8%, up from 0.7% in the previous month. Export prices rose 0.3% on month and 1% on year, while import prices stumbled 0.5% on month and 6.9% on year.

The BoJ also said the value of overall bank lending in Japan was up 3.2% on year in March, coming in at 619.566 trillion yen. That was up from 3% in February. For the first quarter of 2024, overall bank lending was up 3.1% on year.

CURRENCY NEWS: Japanese yen was little changed in the upper 151 range against greenback. At 5 p.m., the yen quoted at 151.72 per US dollar compared to 151.76 in Tokyo at 5 p.m. on Tuesday.

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