While most Japanese shares headed lower early Thursday, green-vehicle news boosts some issues, with Mitsubishi Motors Corp. rising on plans for cheaper electric cars, and with battery-makers gaining on cheery investor sentiment toward eco-friendly products.
Mitsubishi Motors plans to develop a relatively cheap 3-million-yen ($31,400) electric vehicle by 2012 based on its iMiEV car by equipping it with a smaller battery, the Nikkei newspaper reported Thursday.
The battery accounts for almost half the production cost for an electric vehicle, the report said.
The auto maker is already scheduled to sell its i-MiEV electric car next month for roughly 4.6 million yen, including taxes. Although government subsidies will cut the actual buying price to 3.2 million yen, it will still cost almost twice as much as a gasoline-powered car, the report said.
After the release of the new, cheaper version, Mitsubishi hopes to sell more than 30,000 electric cars in fiscal 2013, the report said.
Mitsubishi Motors shares added 3.9%, defying broader weakness among auto stocks. Mazda Motor Corp. lost 4.5%, and Toyota Motor Corp gave up 1.6%.
Separately, Toyota is considering Sanyo Electric Co. as a new battery supplier, as demand for its new Prius hybrid vehicles climbs, Dow Jones Newswires said, citing a Sankei Shimbun report.
Panasonic EV Energy Co. currently supplies Toyota with batteries, but Toyota has started to consider increasing its number of battery suppliers, the report cited an executive from Toyota as saying.
Shares of many battery suppliers had rallied Wednesday, mainly on hopes for Nomura Asset Management's new investment trust -- the RCM Green Technology Fund -- to be set up next week, Dow Jones Newswires quoted a Japanese brokerage equities manager as saying.
The Nomura green technology fund is has provided some of the "underpinning" of the rally, said Brett McGonegal, managing director at Cantor Fitzgerald.
"There has been loads of news in the space, whether its GS Yuasa (Honda hybrid car battery), Kawasaki Heavy (recharging battery for cars and buses) or Sanyo [or] Meidensha ," he said.
"The technology and the prospect of cleaner, greener alternatives should warrant buyers and some nice returns. The question is: Have these names gotten ahead of themselves?" McGonegal said.
On Thursday, Kawasaki Heavy and Sanyo gave back some of those gains, though Meidensha Corp. rose by 8.3% in late morning action.
McGonegal said this meant the market was seeing "some sanity come into the space ... as Sanyo, GS Yuasa and Kawasaki Heavy are under pressure."
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