The Shock from Tokyo

The Tokyo Stock Market sent jitters around the world last week when it closed Monday with an astonoshing 618 point plunge in the Nikkei Stock Average of 225 selected issues, its lowest point in five years. After rising and falling in subsequent days, the market ended the week above the psychologically important 20,000 point level (Friday was a Tokyo market holiday), but it will be watched closely today to see if the worst is over, or last week’s gyrations were just a harbinger of tough times to come.