Asian stocks tank as Russia, Indonesia, Philippines issue tsunami alerts

Hong Kong: Asian shares tanked soon after a massive earthquake hit Japan triggering a tsunami that also engulfed the capital Tokyo. Russia issued warnings for its Far East Sakhalin region, including the Kuril Islands chain, while Philippines and Indonesia issued warnings to citizens in coastal areas to shift to higher ground.

The quake struck just before the close of Tokyo stock trading forcing Nikkei average down 1.7 per cent to a five-week low.

The Hong Kong's Hang Seng share index was down 1.8 per cent, and Nikkei futures in Singapore tumbled more than 3 per cent.

The yen extended losses against the dollar after the quake, falling to 83.29 yen to the dollar compared with 82.80 before it struck.

Correction in Indian stocks deepened after the quake hit Japan and the markets lost further ground mid-day as reports of the massive earthquake in Japan and the tsunami came in.

At 2.45 pm the Sensex was down over 180 points at 18,147.50 and the closely tracking Nifty was down over 54.30 points at 5440.

All BSE sectoral indices were in the red on the Bombay Stock Exchange with metals, power, automobiles and consumer good stocks losing the most.

Market sentiment was extremely negative with 67% of the stocks declining in trades.