Tokyo stocks open lower ahead of earnings season

Tokyo stocks opened lower on Monday amid lingering geopolitical worries including the diplomatic fallout from the death of a Saudi journalist and ahead of corporate earnings report season.

The Nikkei 225 index was off 0.66 percent or 148.69 points at 22,383.39 in early trade, while the broader Topix index was down 0.72 percent or 12.19 points at 1,680.66.

The falls came after a choppy session in New York on Friday, and ahead of the start of Japanese corporate earnings season this week.

Investor focus is shifting to individual shares amid continued global worries that also include a potential escalation in a US-China trade spat, analysts said.

"Due to impact from a US-China trade war, China's private capital investment is seen slowing, which in turn... is weighing on Japanese China-linked shares," Masayuki Kubota, chief strategist at Rakuten Securities, said in a commentary.

The dollar fetched 112.42 yen in early Asian trade, against 112.50 yen in New York late Friday, as a rise in US Treasury yields was somewhat offset by risk-off sentiment, dealers said.

In Tokyo, automakers were among the losers, with Toyota slipping 1.18 percent to 6,499 yen and Honda off 0.97 percent at 3,035 yen.

China-related shares fell, with industrial robot maker Fanuc slipping 1.25 percent to 18,935 yen and electronic parts maker Rohm trading down 2.71 percent at 7,180 yen.