LOS ANGELES: Japanese stocks started Friday flat but soon deflated mildly, with the Nikkei Stock Average NIK, +0.09% and Topix down 0.2% apiece.
With the dollar USDJPY, -0.04% changing hands for ¥120.76, almost exactly where it was a day earlier, the major tech and industrial names were a mixed bag, with Sony Corp. 6758, -0.43% SNE, -0.92% up 0.2%, and Panasonic Corp. 6752, -0.19% PCRFF, +1.74% rising 0.4%, while Hitachi Ltd. 6501, +0.01% HTHIF, +0.44% lost 0.5%, and Kyocera Corp. 6971, +0.41% KYOCF, +7.85% fell 0.4%. Shares of Nintendo Co. 7974, -6.49% NTDOF, -11.16% surrendered 2.9%, consolidating after soaring some 38% in the week to date on news of its plan to make mobile games. Toshiba Corp. 6502, +4.63% TOSYY, +0.40% rose 2.3%, meanwhile, as it announced commercial production of a 13-megapixel image sensor allowing smartphones and tablets to record HD video at a high frame rate. Financially troubled Skymark Airlines Inc. JP:9204 remained untraded 20 minutes into the session as a Nikkei news report said the carrier’s liabilities were more than four times more than previously estimated. And Honda Motor Co. 7267, +0.07% HMC, -1.22% pulled back by a 0.4% after adding more than 100,000 vehicles to its U.S. recall due to faulty airbags.
