Quake selloff wipes $287 billion off Tokyo stock market

[oberliner]

Source: Reuters

A massive selloff on the Tokyo Stock Exchange wiped out some 23.5 trillion yen ($287 billion) from the market's value on Monday with investors dumping stocks as the country recoiled from a devastating earthquake and struggled to avert nuclear disaster.

The selloff triggered record volumes and slashed the market's value to roughly 289 trillion yen.

The Nikkei average tumbled 6.2 percent, its biggest decline in a single day since October 2008, and more than 4.88 billion shares changed hands on the exchange's first section, the highest number since World War 2.

Volume was pushed up by window-dressing selling by domestic institutional investors for the March 31 financial year-end and by domestic investment trusts and anxious retail buyers, while long-term foreign players who have piled into Japanese shares since November also rushed for the exit, market players said.

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/03/14/us-japan-quake-markets-volume-idUSTRE72D2PM20110314

[xchrom]

1. Recommend

[cbdo2007]

2. Sounds like a good time to buy!

[PassingFair]

3. Thank you, Mr. Kudlow. n/t

[LiberalFighter]

4. Buy what? Do they have anything to buy?

[oberliner]

5. Sony is down 7 percent

Maybe that would be a good one.

[somone]

6. Many Japanese-owned assets are not located in Japan

Automobile assembly plants, consumer electronics factories, etc.

[grasswire]

7. if it's true that Toshiba knew the reactors were not safe...

...then Toshiba deserves to take a hit.

[kirby]

8. Heartless...

One of the first news headlines of many I saw right after the earthquake had to do with how it would 'effect the markets'.
No concern about human life just how it would impact the bottom line.

[cbdo2007]

9. There are many facets to the story. Just because you aren't interested in the financial....

aspects of it does not make them insignificant.

[kirby]

10. Not, but it makes it heartless...

And I am taking about the first few hours of the 'breaking news' when it happened.

[cbdo2007]

11. Would this be on a financial network or financial show that you saw that?

[kirby]

12. No

That is what shocked me. If it were Bloomberg or WSJ, I would kinda understand, but this was some mainstream places that I cannot recall now. (Too long ago).

[sarcasmo]

13. Kick, as expected.