Investing.com – Japan equities were lower at the close on Wednesday, as losses in the Mining, Chemical, Petroleum & Plastic and Financial Services sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 declined 0.71%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the Nikkei 225 were Yamato Holdings Co., Ltd. (T:9064), which rose 5.99% or 159.0 points to trade at 2812.0 at the close. Yokogawa Electric Corp. (T:6841) added 5.95% or 130.0 points to end at 2316.0 and Advantest Corp. (T:6857) was up 5.69% or 125.0 points to 2322.0 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Fujifilm Holdings Corp. (T:4901), which lost 8.32% or 380.0 points to trade at 4190.0 in late trade. Tokyo Electron Ltd. (T:8035) declined 4.73% or 1015.0 points to end at 20460.0 and Nisshin Steel Holdings Co., Ltd. (T:5413) shed 3.82% or 73.0 points to 1839.0.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 2477 to 932 and 168 ended unchanged on the Tokyo Stock Exchange.
The Nikkei Volatility, which measures the implied volatility of Nikkei 225 options, was up 6.78% to 17.65 a new 1-month high.
In commodities trading, Crude oil for March delivery was down 0.53% or 0.34 to $64.16 a barrel. Meanwhile, Brent oil for delivery in April fell 0.44% or 0.30 to hit $68.22 a barrel, while the February Gold Futures contract rose 0.52% or 6.90 to trade at $1342.30 a troy ounce.
USD/JPY was down 0.16% to 108.61, while EUR/JPY rose 0.30% to 135.31.
The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.39% at 88.67.