TOKYO: Tokyo stocks opened lower on Thursday in cautious trade after modest Wall Street rallies, as investors weighed the prospects for recovery in major economies.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 index was down 0.31 percent or 88.63 points at 28,553.56 in early trade, while the broader Topix index slipped 0.22 percent or 4.19 points to 1,916.48.

"Japanese shares are seen trading in a narrow range as gains in US shares were only small," Toshiyuki Kanayama, senior market analyst at Monex, said in a commentary.

Investors are also awaiting data including a US manufacturing report due next week, analysts said.

The dollar fetched 109.18 yen in early Asian trade, against 109.13 yen in New York late Wednesday.

In Tokyo, Fujitsu dropped 4.03 percent to 17,760 yen after a US banking group downgraded its rating of the Japanese IT engineering firm shares.

Panasonic was down 1.15 percent at 1,243 yen and Uniqlo casual wear operator Fast Retailing was off 0.91 percent at 87,230 yen, but Sony was up 0.51 percent at 10,755 yen, while Honda was up 0.67 percent at 3,319 yen.

On Wall Street, the Dow ended up less than 0.1 percent at 34,323.05.