TOKYO: Tokyo stocks lost 0.12 percent in a choppy session Thursday morning as a strong yen helped darken sentiment following a dip on Wall Street and a disappointing forecast from US chip giant Intel.
The benchmark Nikkei index fell 12.27 points to 9,993.63 by the lunch break. The Topix index of all first-section issues sagged 0.12 percent, or 1.02 points, to 859.64.
A poor sales forecast from Intel offset optimism over Japan's surprise trade surplus for June, dealers said.
Japan posted an unexpected trade surplus of $897 million in June, the finance ministry said, its first in three months as nation recovers from the devastating impact of the March earthquake and tsunami.
The Intel forecast pressured semiconductor makers in early trade, dealers said, although early losses were later overturned.
Intel's second quarter earnings exceeded expectations, but it trimmed its forecast for PC shipments for the year.
"While the fall in PC sales is widely expected, the downward revision was still disappointing," Kazuhiro Takahashi, general manager of investment strategy and research at Daiwa Securities, told Dow Jones Newswires.
Tokyo Electron recovered from earlier losses to gain 0.35 percent to 4,265 yen, while Ibiden was up 1.22 percent at 2,478.
US stocks fell slightly on Wednesday as investors waited for a resolution to the debt-ceiling standoff in Washington and digested a mixed bag of second-quarter earnings reports.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average shed 0.12 percent or 15.51 points to close at 12,571.91.
A relatively firmer yen against the dollar put pressure on major exporters, with Toyota losing 0.45 percent to 3,310 yen and Honda down 0.62 percent at 3,165 yen.
Notable losers among technology firms were TDK, down 2.05 percent at 4,285 yen, and Panasonic, down 1.57 percent at 936 yen.
Shares in Tokyo Electric Power Co., the operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant at the centre of an ongoing nuclear crisis, were 7.46 percent higher at 547 after the firm said it was on track to achieve a cold shutdown of the plant by January at the latest.
Copyright AFP (Agence France-Presse), 2011
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