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Asia opens in the red
TOKYO, Japan -- Asian stocks have opened lower Tuesday, giving back some of the gains made Monday after the raid into central Baghdad by U.S. forces. In Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 average is down more than 1.2 percent to 8,132.91 after climbing 2.2 percent Monday. The broader Topix index is off about 0.9 percent to 803.09. Big exporters such as Toyota and Nissan are down more than 2 percent. Banks, which had rallied Monday, are losing ground again, as are tech-related stocks such as Kyocera, Toshiba and Hitachi. The market's biggest stock, mobile phone company NTT DoCoMo, is flat at 240,000 yen. Asia's downturn follows the relatively modest gains made on Wall Street Monday, where the Dow Jones industrial average closed 0.28 percent higher at 8,300, down from a session high of 8,520. (Full story) The dollar is trading at about 119.8 yen in early Asian trade, down from Monday's high of 120.89 yen. South Korea's Kospi, which led the region on Monday with a gain of 5 percent, is down about 1.3 percent to 578.36. Big gainers such as Hyundai Motor and Samsung Electronics are down moderately. Australia, Singapore and Taiwan are also lower. New Zealand is flat, trading just into the black. Australia's S&P/ASX200 is down about 0.4 percent to 2968.2, with falls for News Corp and National Australia Bank. But Telstra and BHP Billiton are slightly higher. Singapore's Straits Times index is down about 1.2 percent to 1322.66, led down by SingTel, Singapore Airlines and banking group DBS. In Taiwan, techs and industrials are broadly lower, pushing the Taiex down about 0.11 percent to 4571.01. In Japan, consumer electronics maker Matsushita Electric Industrial lost about 1 percent at 1,018 yen after it said Monday it would post a net loss for a second straight year. That followed a stock market rout which eroded the value of its shareholdings. Reuters contributed to this report.
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