Japanese shares fall further; yen at 3 1/2-month high

Tokyo

JAPANESE shares continued their sickening plunge on Wednesday, falling by a further 2.3 per cent after the previous days' 5.4 per cent drop and prompting analysts to suggest that stock market investors - particularly foreigners - have "given up" on Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's Abenomics policies.

Meanwhile, the yen remained at a three-and-a-half-month high against the dollar, which likewise suggested that foreign-exchange markets do not believe that the drastic new monetary-easing steps announced recently by the Bank of Japan (BOJ) can stave off the damaging further appreciation of the Japanese currency.