“It’s A Disaster” – Japanese Stocks Suffer Biggest Point Drop Since Black Monday

• “It’s A Disaster” – Japanese Stocks Suffer Biggest Point Drop Since Black Monday
  by Tyler Durden, https://www.zerohedge.com/
  We warned yesterday that the BoJ has boxed itself into a corner – forced to decide between a crashing currency or a crashing stock market – and overnight it appears traders put policymakers to the test to see what their reaction function might be.
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  Yen strength exacerbated an ugly US session and dragged Japanese stocks down further overnight as Japan’s Topix Index entered a technical correction in its worst two-day rout since 2011…:
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  “The recent strengthening of the Japanese yen coupled with tech sector weakness is poised to significantly impact the Asian stock market,” said Manish Bhargava, a fund manager at Straits Investment Holdings in Singapore.
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  “Given the substantial weight of tech stocks in Asian indices, disappointing results from tech giants could trigger a broader market downturn in Asian markets.”
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  So which will the policymakers choose to save?
  icholas Smith, Japan equity strategist at CLSA, said, “I think markets globally are having a headless chicken moment,” with investors excessively worried about the change in currency rates.
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  “Stocks getting hit hardest are the ones that surged this year,” he said.
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  Japan’s benchmark Nikkei Stock Average on Friday recorded the second biggest daily drop in its history, as stocks extended losses following a sell-off in New York overnight. The index plunged to 35,909.70, down 2,216.63 points, or 5.81%, marking its lowest close since Jan. 26.
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  Friday’s decline was the second largest in the index’s history after the Black Monday crash of October 1987, when global markets sank and the index cratered by 3,836.48 points.
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