Japan's Nikkei average to rebound on Wall St, yen

TOKYO, Aug 20 (Reuters) Japan's Nikkei stock average is expected to post a sharp rebound on Monday, recovering from its biggest one-day fall in nearly 6 years, with investors encouraged by a big rally on Wall Street and a fall in the yen.

Investors will likely snap up Toyota Motor Corp. and other large auto and technology exporters that led the Nikkei's 5.4 percent slide in the previous session. Toyota's shares traded in the U.S. finished Friday at the equivalent of about 6,550 yen, nearly 6 percent above the Tokyo close.

''The market is likely to rebound, following a strong gain in the U.S. market on Friday as well as the dollar's advance against the yen,'' said Hiroichi Nishi, general manager of equity marketing at Nikko Cordial Securities.

''I expect to see buying across the board, led by shares of blue chip companies, which suffered steep falls.'' Nikkei futures traded pointed to a big rally. Contracts traded in Chicago finished the previous session at 15,835.00, 535 points above the Osaka close Market participants said the Nikkei would likely trade between 15,300 and 15,850 on Monday, after finishing Friday at 15,273.68.

On Wall Street, the Standard&Poor's 500 Index shot up 2.46 percent after the Federal Reserve cut the discount rate it charges banks in an emergency move to stabilize credit markets and keep the economy on track.

Investors in Japan will also likely be encouraged by the dollar's recovery to about 114.30 from a 14-month low of 111.6 yen on Friday. The yen's recent surge is threatening to cut into the profits of exporters such as Toyota made abroad.

STOCKS TO WATCH -- Advantest Corp. and other chip equipment makers Orders for Japanese equipment used to make microchips fell short of sales in July as memory makers unloaded excess inventory and reined in spending plans, an industry group said on Friday.

-- Daikin Industries Ltd.

Daikin, Japan's largest maker of air conditioners, plans to start selling central air conditioning systems for households in the United States as early as next summer, the Nikkei business daily reported on Monday.

-- TonenGeneral Sekiyu K.K.

The oil refiner and distributor said on Friday it will buy back up to 20 billion yen (5 million) of its own shares, equal to 3.09 percent of the outstanding total, between Aug. 20 and Dec. 31.

It also said it would raise its annual dividend by 0.5 yen per share to 37.5 yen.

-- Nippon Steel Corp., JFE Holdings Inc.

Nippon Steel and JFE Holdings, Japan's two largest steelmakers, separately plan to mass-produce multicrystal silicon for solar cells, the Nikkei business daily reported on Sunday.

-- Rohm Co. Ltd.

The specialty semiconductor maker said on Friday that it planned to spend up to 10 billion yen to buy back up to 1 million of its own shares from Aug. 20 to Sept. 14. It said the buyback was equal to 0.84 percent of its total outstanding shares.

-- Asics Corp., Asics Trading Co.

Shoemaker Asics Corp. said on Friday that it would spend about 2.9 billion yen to raise its stake in Asics Trading from the current level of 35.4 percent to strengthen business ties.

Asics said it would pay 2,150 yen per Asics Trading share in a tender offer from Aug. 20 to Sept. 14. The offer price represents a 38 percent premium to Asics Trading's closing price on Friday of 1,560 yen.

-- Kubota Corp.

Kubota plans to spend about 3 billion baht to build a tractor plant in Thailand by March 2009, the Nikkei business daily reported on Monday.

-- Matsushita Electric Industrial, PanaHome Matsushita is considering the sale of its housing subsidiary PanaHome Corp. and is in talks with some housing makers, TV Tokyo reported on Friday.

Both Matsushita and Panahome denied the report in statements issued over the weekend.

Reuters CS VP0510