Japan shares lower at close of trade; Nikkei 225 down 1.53% By Investing.com

Investing.com – Japan equities were lower at the close on Thursday, as losses in the Paper & Pulp, Railway & Bus and Real Estate sectors propelled shares lower.

At the close in Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 lost 1.53%.

The biggest gainers of the session on the Nikkei 225 were Rakuten Inc (T:4755), which rose 7.53% or 74.0 points to trade at 1057.0 at the close. Mitsubishi Motors Corp. (T:7211) added 6.75% or 16.0 points to end at 253.0 and Dentsu Inc. (T:4324) was up 6.74% or 215.0 points to 3405.0 in late trade.

Biggest losers included CyberAgent Inc (T:4751), which lost 9.19% or 690.0 points to trade at 6820.0 in late trade. Tokyo Electron Ltd. (T:8035) declined 4.62% or 2030.0 points to end at 41870.0 and Fujitsu Ltd. (T:6702) shed 4.54% or 750.0 points to 15780.0.

Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 2191 to 1346 and 194 ended unchanged on the Tokyo Stock Exchange.

The Nikkei Volatility, which measures the implied volatility of Nikkei 225 options, was unchanged 0% to 22.31.

In commodities trading, Crude oil for March delivery was down 0.81% or 0.43 to $52.42 a barrel. Meanwhile, Brent oil for delivery in April fell 0.83% or 0.46 to hit $55.07 a barrel, while the February Gold Futures contract fell 0.68% or 12.50 to trade at $1832.40 a troy ounce.

USD/JPY was up 0.25% to 104.36, while EUR/JPY rose 0.06% to 126.12.

The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.21% at 90.828.