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TOKYO: Japan’s Nikkei share average eased on Tuesday in choppy trade, weighed down by declines in Advantest and SoftBank Group, although strong outlook-driven gains in some technology stocks helped limit losses. The Nikkei was down 0.1% at 52,361.14 by the midday break. The broader Topix rose 0.38% to 3,344.48. Chip-testing equipment maker Advantest lost 3.63% and technology investor SoftBank Group fell 1.33%, dragging the index the most. “The Nikkei went up and down today, but sentiment was strong as seen in the gains of the Topix index,” said Shuutarou Yasuda, a market analyst at Tokai Tokyo Intelligence Laboratory. “The market momentum was supported by the strong performance of US technology stocks such as Amazon,” he said. The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq closed higher on Monday, with artificial intelligence-related deals driving much of the gains. Amazon rose 4% after announcing a $38 billion deal with OpenAI. Japan’s stock market was closed for a public holiday on Monday. On Tuesday, Tokyo Electron jumped 3.95% after the chip-making equipment maker on Friday hiked its operating profit forecast by 2.8% for the year ending March 2026. Sumitomo Electric, a gauge for investments for AI data centres, surged 12.73% after the cable maker raised its annual net profit forecast by 18.7% to 230 billion yen ($1.53 billion). Other decliners included chip-related Socionext, which tanked 19.54% after flagging its annual net profit would fall 65.8% to 6.7 billion yen. Of more than 1,600 stocks trading on the Tokyo Stock Exchange’s prime market, 67% rose, 30% fell, while 2% traded flat.
