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Technology Stocks : Softbank Group Corp -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: debra vogt who wrote (4731)	4/4/2000 10:18:00 PM
From: debra vogt	Respond to of 6018

Tuesday April 4, 9:34 pm Eastern Time Hikari Tsushin tumbles further, support unseen TOKYO, April 5 (Reuters) - Shares in Japan's leading mobile phone subscription firm and Internet investor Hikari Tsushin Inc extended steep falls on Wednesday as suspicions mounted over its valuation and speculators scrambled to liquidate holdings. Hikari Tsushin was ask only at 58,800 yen at 0130 GMT, down by its daily limit of 5,000. It has plunged nearly 75 percent since its intraday peak of 241,000 yen hit on February 15. Traders said they saw few hints of where the falls would stop, although some saw a floor around 50,000 yen -- a round figure and a level last seen in August, 1999, before it began its surge along with other Internet and information technology shares. ``No one really knows where downside resistance is, we're seeing a vicious cycle as losses prompt more selling,' said Masakazu Kimura, general equities manager at Universal Securities. Investors engaged in margin trading, and faced with demands from brokers to come up with more cash owing to the drop in the share price, were liquidating positions and adding to the sell-off, traders said. Daiwa Institute of Research Ltd said on Wednesday it had downgraded Hikari Tsushin to a ``C' rating from a previous ``A,' meaning it is expected to underperform the TOPIX index of all first section shares on the Tokyo Stock Exchange by more than 10 percentage points over the next six months. Hikari Tsushin's business model seemed, at least in the short-term, to be shaken, it said. Especially because its rise toward the end of last year had been based on a positive appraisal of its business model, which was then seen nimble enough to keep growing in a rapidly changing environment. That followed downgradings by other brokerages in the past few days, prompted by the company's profit warning on Friday just a day after it had announced an upward revision in its earnings forecast --a move traders criticised as a reflection of poor disclosure. Shares in Softbank Corp , a key Internet investor, was down by its daily limit of 5,000 yen to be ask-only at 76,500, extending its recent falls. Yahoo Japan Corp , in which it has large investments, fell 4.76 percent to 46 million yen. Traders said Softbank and Yahoo would likely recover more quickly than Hikari because there were fewer doubts over their business.