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Tokyo stocks opened 0.83 per cent lower today with renewed worries over the European debt crisis and the size of a bailout fund designed to help the bloc’s most indebted nations.
The Nikkei 225 index at the Tokyo Stock Exchange opened down 70.19 points at 8,407.63.
The Tokyo market opened soon after Mr Jean-Claude Juncker, head of the group of eurozone finance ministers, said in Brussels that the eurozone will likely fall short of its goal of increasing the firepower of a debt rescue fund to € 1 trillion ($1.33 trillion).
“We haven’t lowered our ambitions but the conditions have changed, so it will probably not be € 1 trillion but less,” he told reporters after a finance ministers meeting.
“But it will still be substantial,” added Luxembourg Premier, Mr Juncker.
The ministers gave the rescue fund, the €440-billion European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF), new weapons as part of efforts to increase its firepower but they were unable to give it a new headline figure.
The EFSF has helped Ireland and Portugal but is deemed too small to save Italy and Spain if the crisis brings these countries to their knees.
The ministers’ meeting agreed to allow the fund to guarantee 20-30 per cent of potential losses incurred by investors who buy bonds of governments in financial trouble.
They also decided to create co-investment funds to allow public and private investors to participate in the EFSF.
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