Tokyo stocks finish at six-month low

The Nikkei average fell 2 percent to a nearly six-month closing low on Thursday, with banks like Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group suffering after Lehman Brothers failed to alleviate worries about its ability to survive the credit crisis.
Blue chip exporters such as Canon Inc dropped amid uncertainty about the health of the global economy, while slides in other Asian equity markets during the afternoon added impetus to the Nikkei's decline. Hopes that Lehman would announce confidence-boosting steps had supported bank shares a day earlier but market participants said they found only disappointment.
"Investors are selling because not even a mouse came out after the mountains roared and shook," said Fujio Ando, senior managing director at Chibagin Asset Management. The benchmark Nikkei average ended down 244.13 points at 12,102.50, its lowest close since March 18. The broader Topix declined 2.5 percent to 1,162.72.
The market was also hurt by weak economic data. Japan's core private-sector machinery orders shrank in July as manufacturers prepared capital spending cuts to hunker down for a slump in export markets and a recession at home. "The economic situation is not good globally," said Naoki Fujiwara, fund manager at Shinkin Asset Management.
"Although the fall in machinery orders was in line with forecasts, it does not change the fact that they fell, and it adds to concerns for the outlook for capital spending," he said. Japan's top lender Mitsubishi UFJ fell 5.1 percent to 823 yen, while No 2 Mizuho Financial Group lost 5.3 percent to 445,000 yen.
Nomura Holdings Japan's biggest brokerage, skidded 5.9 percent to 1,440 yen. Digital camera maker Canon declined 3.6 percent to 4,300 yen, becoming the biggest drag on the Nikkei. Honda Motor Co Ltd fell 2.2 percent to 3,550 yen.
Hitachi Ltd fell 4.8 percent to 732 yen after Chubu Electric Power Co said it would sue the electronics maker, seeking $390 million in damages as well as late payment charges due to problems with a Hitachi-made turbine at the utility's nuclear plant. Trade picked up, with 1.95 billion shares changing hands, compared with last week's daily average of 1.91 billion. Declining shares outnumbered advancing ones by more than four to one.