TOKYO: Tokyo stocks closed sharply lower Tuesday, tracking a global sell-off on worries about Donald Trump's controversial crackdown on immigration, while a stronger yen hammered exporters.
The new US president on Friday signed an executive order banning entry to travellers from seven Muslim-majority countries and imposing a temporary ban on refugees. The move was met with widespread outrage from world leaders, and global protests.
"Amid surging criticism against (the) travel ban, market participants are contemplating that Trump has gone overboard," Toshihiko Matsuno, strategist at SMBC Friend Securities, told Bloomberg News.
In Tokyo, the dollar was changing hands at 113.44 yen, down from 113.81 yen in New York and well below 115.06 yen on Friday.
Traders have warned that safe haven assets like the yen could be favoured by investors on worries over how Trump's policies will be carried out.
A stronger yen is a negative for Japanese exporters because it makes their products less competitive abroad and shrinks repatriated profits.
Tokyo's benchmark Nikkei 225 index tumbled 1.69 percent, or 327.51 points, to 19,041.34, while the broader Topix index of all first-section issues fell 1.43 percent, or 22.10 points, to 1,521.67.
Markets in New York and across Europe followed losses in Asia Monday as traders fret over the outlook for the global economy.
Before the Nikkei opened Tuesday official data showed industrial output in December rose 0.5 percent on month, beating market consensus, but household spending, a key element in Tokyo's economic revitalisation plans, fell for the 10th consecutive month.
Wrapping up a two-day policy meeting, the Bank of Japan decided to leave its monetary easing programme unchanged but upgraded its economic growth outlook through 2019, citing an improved global outlook and weaker yen.
In share trading NEC plunged 17.40 percent to 261 yen after it cut its full-year profit forecasts.
Toshiba sank 3.19 percent to 242.3 yen on concerns about its US nuclear business while Sony fell 2.25 percent to 3,423 yen after it said it will take a writedown of nearly $1 billion in the fiscal third quarter, blaming expected weaker profits in its movie business.
Toyota shed 1.80 percent to 6,584 yen while Honda lost 2.81 percent to 3,387 yen after it announced plans with General Motors for the first "mass production" of an advanced hydrogen fuel cell system.
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