Japanese Market Sharply Lower, Down 2%

(RTTNews) - The Japanese stock market is sharply higher on Monday, snapping the three-session winning streak, following the broadly negative cues from Wall Street on Friday, with the Nikkei 225 falling more than 2 percent to be just above the 38,700 level, with weakness across most sectors led by index heavyweights, automakers and technology stocks.

The stocks were hammered after White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed President Donald Trump's threatened tariffs will be levied against major U.S. trading partners beginning Saturday, including China.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 Index is 842.86 points or 2.13 percent at 38,729.63, after hitting a low of 38,454.38 earlier. Japanese shares ended slightly higher on Friday.

Market heavyweight SoftBank Group is losing almost 1 percent and Uniqlo operator Fast Retailing is declining more than 2 percent. Among automakers, Honda is sliding almost 7 percent and Toyota is losing almost 5 percent.

In the tech space, Advantest and are losing more than 3 percent, Screen Holdings is slipping almost 3 percent and Tokyo Electron is declining more than 2 percent.

In the banking sector, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial is losing almost 2 percent, Mizuho Financial is down almost 1 percent and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial is down more than 2 percent.

The major exporters are mostly lower. Panasonic is declining more than 3 percent and Mitsubishi Electric is down more than 1 percent each, while Sony and Canon are losing almost 2 percent each.

Among the other major losers, Socionext is plummeting more than 13 percent and NH Foods id plunging more than 11 percent, while TDK, Mazda Motor, Nissan Motor and Seiko Epson are sliding almost 8 percent each.Denso is declining more than 7 percent, while Fuji Electric, M3 and Shin-Etsu Chemical are slipping more than 6 percent each. Komatsu and Renesas Electronics are losing almost 6 percent, while Subaru is down more than 5 percent.

Conversely, Sumitomo Pharma is skyrocketing more than 16 percent and Konami Group is soaring more than 10 percent, while Sumitomo Chemical and Alps Alpine are surging more than 5 percent each. ZOZO is advancing almost 4 percent.

In the currency market, the U.S. dollar is trading in the higher 155 yen-range on Monday.

On Wall Street, stocks came under pressure over the course of the trading day on Friday after showing a strong move to the upside early in the session. The major averages pulled back well off their early highs and into negative territory.

The major averages finished the day just off their lows of the session. The Dow slid 337.47 points or 0.8 percent to 44,544.66, the S&P 500 fell 30.64 points or 0.5 percent to 6,040.53 and the Nasdaq dipped 54.31 points or 0.3 percent to 19,627.44.

Meanwhile, the major European markets all moved modestly higher on the day. While the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index rose by 0.3 percent, the French CAC 40 Index inched up by 0.1 percent and the German DAX Index closed just above the unchanged line.

Crude oil prices settled lower Friday amid uncertainty about implementation of Trump's tariff plans on Canada and Mexico, while a stronger dollar also weighed. West Texas Intermediate crude oil futures for March fell $0.20 at $72.53 a barrel.