Sony falls below 1,000 yen for first time since 1980

Sony shares tumbled below 1,000 yen Monday for the first time since 1980 and the era of the Walkman, sending the value of the company crashing to less than a tenth of what it was just over a decade ago. The entertainment and electronics giant dropped 1.67 percent to close at 996 yen broadly in line with the benchmark Nikkei index, which shed 1.71 percent on the Tokyo Stock Exchange to a six-month low.
Tokyo followed a fall on Wall Street after dismal US jobs figures sent shivers through the financial world amid fears the global economy had caught a chill. Dealers said Sony last traded below the psychologically important 1,000 yen level in August 1980 around a year after its landmark "Walkman" portable music player was released. The total market value of the company is now around one trillion yen ($13 billion), compared with 11 trillion yen in 2000, the year PlayStation 2 was released and shares hit a peak of 16,950 yen, dealers and news reports said.