TOKYO: Tokyo stocks gave up gains and closed lower Tuesday on continued worry about the Omicron coronavirus variant, after Moderna's chief warned existing vaccines might be less effective against the strain.
The benchmark Nikkei 225 index dropped 1.63 percent, or 462.16 points, to end at 27,821.76, while the broader Topix index fell 1.03 percent, or 20.13 points, to 1,928.35.
Okasan Online Securities said that the market "was unable to to shrug off concerns over the Omicron variant".
The head of Moderna said in an interview with the Financial Times published on Tuesday that Covid-19 vaccines are less likely to be effective against the new variant.
"There is no world, I think, where [the effectiveness] is the same level we had with Delta," Stephane Bancel said.
"I think it's going to be a material drop. I just don't know how much because we need to wait for the data. But all the scientists I've talked to are like 'this is not going to be good'."
The dollar fetched 113.14 yen in Asian trade, against 113.58 yen in New York late Monday.
In Tokyo trading, SoftBank Group fell 2.86 percent to 6,030 yen while Fast Retailing tumbled 4.39 percent to 67,400 yen.
Nissan plunged 5.15 percent to 562.9 yen after it said its global output in October dived 21.5 percent and it unveiled plans for electric and hybrid vehicles to make up half its global sales by 2030.
Its bigger rival Toyota lost percent to 2,001 yen following a 25.8 percent decline in global output in October. Honda slipped 0.73 percent to 3,101 yen.
Sony advanced 0.54 percent to 13,825 yen while Olympus jumped 2.96 percent to 2,539 yen.
Japan's latest job market data was mixed, with the jobless rate improving to 2.7 percent in October from 2.8 percent in the previous month, while the ratio of jobs to job-seekers slightly worsened to 1.15, meaning there are 115 openings for every 100 people seeking employment.
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