The Japanese stock market is trading weak on Friday, snapping a four-session winning streak, with investors indulging in some selling amid a few weak earnings reports.
A flat lead from Wall Street and concerns about a likely slowdown of the Japanese economy are also contributing to the market's weakness.
Pharmaceuticals, foods, automobile, chemicals and communications stocks are mostly trading lower. Electric power, machinery and retail stocks are edging higher.
The benchmark Nikkei 225 index is down 39 points or 0.4 percent 8,939.6.
Trend Micro Inc shares are down nearly 11 percent with investors pressing heavy sales at the counter after the company said net profit for July-September is likely to be significantly lower.
Sumitomo Realty & Development, Mitsubishi Motors, Tokyo Dome, Olympus Corp, Taisei Corp, Secom and Nissan Chemical Industries are trading lower by 2 to 3 percent.
Fast Retailing is down nearly 2 percent. Japan Tobacco, Yahoo Japan, Bridgestone Corp, Dowa Holdings, Furukawa, Softbank Corp, Honda Motor (HMC) and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial (MTU) are also trading notably lower.
Among the prominent gainers, Taiyo Yuden is up nearly 10 percent. Oki Electric Industry is gaining 7.5 percent after the previous session's terrible setback.
NTN Corp, Sharp Corp, Konami Corp, Pacific Metals and Asahi Glass are up 3 to 5 percent.
Sony Corp (SNE, SON.L) is up nearly 4.5 percent following the company offering to buy out online shopping site So-net Entertainment Corp.
Asahi Glass, Nippon Paper Group, Mitsubishi Materials, Pioneer Corp, Mitsubishi Chemicals and MS&AD Insurance Group Holdings are also up sharply.
On the economic front, an index measuring the prices of domestic corporate goods was down 0.4 percent on month in July, the Bank of Japan said on Friday, showing a score of 100.1.
That was well below forecasts for an increase of 0.1 percent following the downwardly revised 0.7 percent contraction in June (originally -0.6 percent).
On a yearly basis, prices plummeted 2.1 percent versus forecasts for a decline of 1.5 percent following the downwardly revised fall of 1.4 percent (originally 1.3 percent).
The Export price index fell 0.5 percent on month, while the import price index plunged 2.3 percent.
In the currency market, the U.S. dollar traded in the upper 78 yen range in early deals in Tokyo. The yen is currently trading at 78.60 to the dollar.
Among other markets in the Asia-Pacific region, Australia, Hong Kong and Malaysia are trading weak, while Shanghai, New Zealand, South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan are up marginally. Markets across the region had ended mostly higher on Thursday.
On Wall Street, stocks turned in a lackluster performance on Thursday with traders refraining from making significant moves. The major averages remained stuck near the unchanged line throughout the session after ending the previous session nearly flat.
The Dow edged down 10.4 points or 0.1 percent to 13,165.2, while the Nasdaq rose 7.4 points or 0.3 percent to 3,018.6 and the S&P 500 crept up 0.6 points or less than a tenth of a percent to 1,402.8.
Major European markets too ended on a mixed note on Thursday. While the German DAX index closed just below the unchanged line, the U.K.'s FTSE 100 index edged up by 0.1 percent and the French CAC 40 index gained 0.5 percent.
U.S. crude oil settled a penny higher on Thursday, mostly on expectation of further monetary policy easing after data from China showed a drop in Chinese consumer price inflation to a 30-month low in July.
Crude oil for September delivery gained $0.01 to close at $93.36 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, after scaling a high of $94.21 a barrel intraday.
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