The Tokyo equities markets were lower on Monday as investors worried about higher oil prices and a declining dollar in relation to the yen. The Nikkei 225 was down 2.8 percent on the day to 16,914.40 while the Topix index was 2.6 percent lower, closing at 1,710.76. Despite the drop in the dollar, exporters did no worse than domestic stocks.
Transport equipment and electrical machinery were two of the export-sensitive sectors to see big declines, dropping 2.7 percent and 2.5 percent respectively. Toyota dropped 2.8 percent to ¥6,710, for example. NEC dropped 4.5 percent to ¥834 when it warned of lower profits, while Hitachi was down 4.2 percent to ¥841, Sony fell 2.9 percent to ¥5,970, and Sharp declined by 2.4 percent to ¥2,015.
In domestic sectors, consumer finance companies were down again after the expected announcement that a government panel has proposed a drop in the maximum rate of interest the companies can charge on loans. OMC Card dropped 11.3 percent to ¥1,690 after one of its subsidiaries was told to suspend operations because it had violated rules on lending. Elsewhere in the sector, Credit Saison was down 4.4 percent to ¥5,670 and Takefuji lost 2.5 percent to ¥7,030.