(by G. Andersen)

Technology shares pushed the Tokyo stock market to a seven-week low as quarterly earnings from the US continued to fuel concern about the sector’s outlook.

The Nikkei 225 average closed down 1.6 per cent at 11,258.37 while the Topix index lost 1 per cent to 1,139.53.

Semiconductor stocks were among the biggest losers as the market remained beset by worries about a surplus of chip production capacity and a fall in demand.

Analysts at several brokers have downgraded their forecasts for earnings in the sector in recent weeks while disappointing quarterly results and forecasts from Intel and others aggravated worries about an imminent downturn.

The information and communications sector index lost 2.4 per cent.

Advantest, a leading maker of chip production equipment, dropped 4.7 per cent to Y6,240 while Tokyo Electron, a rival, fell 4.6 per cent to Y5,200.

Among chip-makers, NEC fell 2.7 per cent to Y693, Hitachi dropped 2 per cent to Y686 and Fujitsu lost 2.1 per cent to Y685.

Hoya, a leading maker of components used in semiconductor and LCD production, dropped 0.6 per cent to Y1,1110 even though the company said during trading that its operating profit jumped 45 per cent from a year ago in the April-June quarter.

Trend Micro, a maker of anti-virus software, fell 4.3 per cent to Y4,190 while Yahoo Japan dropped 4.4 per cent to Y868,000.