Japanese Stock Average Takes Record Plunge

The Tokyo Stock Exchange, which reopened Tuesday after a long holiday weekend, plunged even further, setting a new record for the largest decline in a single day’s trading.

The 225-share Nikkei stock average, which fell a record 460.73 points on Friday, dropped 637.33 points Tuesday to close at 17,463.19. The market was closed Monday because of a national holiday.

The previous record loss for a single session was set on April 16, 1985, when the Nikkei index dropped 345.45 points.

Activity was light today, with about 500 million shares traded in the market’s first section, down from about 900 million shares on Friday. Losers exceeded gainers by 730 to 115, with 104 stocks unchanged.

The Tokyo market’s plunge on Friday was widely seen as a reaction to the previous day’s record 86.61-point drop in the Dow Jones average on Wall Street in New York.

Some dealers saw the mammoth two-day drop on the Tokyo market as an overdue correction to long-overheated stock prices.