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To: goldsnow who wrote (4451)	12/19/1997 12:12:00 AM
From: Bucky Katt	Respond to of 116753

GS--Did you know the Eurodollar was invented by the Soviet Union's State Bank in 1952? And, do you know why they invented it? And, the other shoe drops>>Tokyo stocks plunged by midday on Friday, with the stock market's main barometer falling by nearly six percent in the aftermath of foodstuffs trader Toshoku Ltd's business failure. The Nikkei average finished the morning down 923.58 points, or 5.71 percent, at 15,238.06 -- perilously close to the psychologically important 15,000 mark that it last breached on November 14, just before Yamaichi Securities Co Ltd went bust. A triple-digit loss for U.S. stocks overnight contributed to the grim market mood, traders said. Investors worry that the collapse of Toshoku -- the fourth-largest bankruptcy in post-war Japan -- is an indication that Japanese banks have tightened lending policies so severely that the economy is on the verge of a credit crunch. Toshoku, a major player in the international grain markets, said on Thursday it was forced to file for bankruptcy protection because it was unable to continue under the weight of its bad loans as banks turned the screws on lending. ''Investors are concerned that bank reluctance to extend loans -- as demonstrated by the Toshoku failure -- could trigger deflation in the Japanese economy,'' a market analyst at a major brokerage said. The pessimism on the economic outlook prompted selling in some stocks whose prices have been hovering lower than their face values, pushing down the overall index, traders said. The dollar also rose against the yen on the ''Toshoku shock'' and the Nikkei's plunge, although its ascent was tempered by the Bank of Japan's (BOJ) apparent intervention and verbal warnings against excessive rises from Japanese and U.S. officials. The BOJ was seen selling dollars for yen intermittently in morning trading, while influential Japanese finance official Eisuke Sakakibara made repeated comments saying Tokyo will stand up against further yen weakness. ''We will act against a excessive fall in the yen in a decisive manner,'' Sakakibara said. ''We are regularly keeping close touch with other Group of Seven (G7) nations.'' The U.S. Treasury also weighed in, saying Japanese currency intervention was consistent with U.S. concerns about the sagging yen. ''The actions taken by the Japanese authorities in the exchange markets are appropriate. We share the concerns they have expressed about the yen,'' a Treasury spokesman said. He declined to comment, however, on whether the United States also took part in the intervention. The dollar was trading at just above 129 yen in early afternoon Tokyo, after closing in New York at 128.66 yen. Japanese government bonds yields, which moves inversely to price movements, jumped by midday following the Nikkei's sharp drop and a BOJ outright bond buying operation, traders said. The yield on the key 182nd cash bond fell to 1.605 percent by midday on Friday from 1.625 percent on Thursday.