TOKYO: Japan’s Nikkei share average ended at a two-month low on Monday, as worries about recession and a potential global banking sector crisis drove a sell-off of risk assets despite a weekend rescue deal for Swiss lender Credit Suisse.
The Nikkei index fell 1.42% to close at 26,945.67, its lowest close since Jan 23.
The broader Topix lost 1.54% to 1,929.30. “I had thought the news about rescue for Credit Suisse would be positive for the market, but it fell deeper than I expected,” said Shigetoshi Kamada, general manager at the research department at Tachibana Securities.
“Global investors are staying away from risk assets right now so the Japanese market declines in line with that trend.”
In a crisis that began with the collapse of US-based Silicon Valley Bank last Friday, investors lost confidence in US regional banks and Credit Suisse in Europe.
Wall Street closed lower on Friday, with three main indexes ended the session deep in negative territory, with financial stocks down the most among the major sectors of the S&P 500.
Over the weekend, UBS Group AG said it will buy Credit Suisse for 3 billion francs ($3.2 billion) and assume up to $5.4 billion in losses, in a shotgun merger engineered by Swiss authorities.
In Japan, the banking sector index on the Tokyo Stock Exchange lost 1.88% after jumping more than 1% earlier in the session.
The index has lost 13.6% so far this month, the worst performer along with the insurance sector which also marked a similar decline.
Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group lost 1.84% and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group slipped 1.67%.
Mizuho Financial Group fell 2.3%.
All the 33 industry sub-indexes lost, with the shippers falling the most, falling 3.78%. Oil refiners cut its early gains to end 0.17% lower.