Japan MarketsJapan stocks tumble on renewed bank fears

TOKYO — Japanese stocks tumbled Tuesday, with investors rattled by a blowout in problem loans at a major U.S. bank and an unsettling production outlook for Toyota Motor Corp. The benchmark Nikkei 225 stock average declined 213.42 points, or 2.4 percent, to 8,711.33 — its lowest closing level in two weeks. The broader Topix fell 2.1 percent to 830.72.

Overnight on Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial shed 3.6 percent on news of mounting bad loans at Bank of America. Investors reverted to worrying about the banking industry again after the bank, while posting a profit in the first quarter, said it was setting aside $13.4 billion to cover losses from souring loans.

Japan’s biggest bank, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc., fell 1 percent to 491 yen, Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group Inc. was down 1.7 percent to 2,980 yen, and Mizuho Financial Group Inc. slipped 1 percent to 195 yen.

Nomura Holdings Inc., Japan’s biggest securities firm, slumped 3.7 percent to 578 yen.

Shin Tamura, a banking analyst at Deutsche Securities Inc. in Tokyo, warned that bank shares face a rocky road in the near term, particularly with earnings reports from U.S. banks still coming in and the results of the Federal Reserve’s stress tests out soon.

The sell-off in Tokyo was widespread, extending to trading houses, commodities-related shares and automakers.

Toyota Motor Corp. lost 3.9 percent to 3,720 yen after Japan’s top-selling daily reported that the automaker’s domestic output this fiscal year is likely to fall to the lowest level in more than three decades. As a result, the company will have difficulty maintaining its entire full-time work force and may need to make some cuts, according to the Yomiuri newspaper.

The company declined to comment on the report.

Honda Motor Co. stumbled 4.9 percent to 2,730 yen and Mitsubishi Motors Corp. lost 2 percent to 144 yen.

Electronics retailers bucked the trend, jumping on news that the government would start its incentive program for “eco-friendly” shopping on May 15.

Retailer Yamada Denki Co. jumped almost 9 percent to 4,780 yen, while rival Edion Corp. surged 13 percent to 391 yen.

In currencies, the dollar strengthened to 98.22 yen from 97.99 yen late Monday. The euro held steady at $1.2909.

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AP Writer Shino Yuasa contributed to this report.