Investing.com – Japan equities were lower at the close on Thursday, as losses in the Construction, Finance & Investment and Gas & Water sectors propelled shares lower.
At the close in Tokyo, the Nikkei 225 declined 1.18%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the Nikkei 225 were Otsuka Holdings Ltd (T:4578), which rose 5.25% or 262.0 points to trade at 5251.0 at the close. Nippon Telegraph & Telephone Corp (T:9432) added 2.55% or 121.0 points to end at 4875.0 and Sony Financial Holdings Inc. (T:8729) was up 1.78% or 35.0 points to 2001.0 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Nisshin Steel Holdings Co., Ltd. (T:5413), which lost 5.17% or 80.0 points to trade at 1468.0 in late trade. Kajima Corp. (T:1812) declined 3.97% or 41.0 points to end at 992.0 and Ricoh Co., Ltd. (T:7752) shed 3.92% or 47.0 points to 1151.0.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 2359 to 1012 and 180 ended unchanged on the Tokyo Stock Exchange.
The Nikkei Volatility, which measures the implied volatility of Nikkei 225 options, was down 3.69% to 22.96.
In commodities trading, Crude oil for April delivery was down 0.88% or 0.54 to $61.14 a barrel. Meanwhile, Brent oil for delivery in April fell 0.73% or 0.48 to hit $64.94 a barrel, while the April Gold Futures contract fell 0.59% or 7.80 to trade at $1324.30 a troy ounce.
USD/JPY was down 0.29% to 107.46, while EUR/JPY fell 0.38% to 131.89.
The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.04% at 90.07.