* Yen hits 13-year high vs dollar, 6-year high vs euro
* Yen soars on Japan investor repatriation, risk fears
* Nikkei plunges below 8,000, Aussie slides 7 pct vs yen
* Dollar rises near 2-year high vs euro
* Emerging market, global economy woes underpin dollar
By Chikako Mogi
TOKYO, Oct 24 (Reuters) - The yen hit a 13-year peak against
the dollar and a six-year high versus the euro on Friday as fears
of a deep global economic recession and emerging market troubles
prompted many investors to cut overseas investments and
repatriate funds.
But the dollar jumped to a five-year high against the pound
and held near two-year highs versus the euro as deepening
financial turmoil forced more investors to dump investments
around the world and raise their cash holdings in the greenback.
Emerging markets, from South Korea to Mexico, have been hit
hard by the global credit crisis in the past few weeks, as
worries of a sharp global slowdown have spurred heavy investor
selling of risky positions built up in recent years.
All week, traders in Tokyo have cited Japanese fund managers
and institutional investors as selling some of their huge
holdings of foreign assets and yanking money back home.
The yen has also soared as market players have unwound carry
trades built up over the past several years, using the
low-yielding yen to buy high-yielding currencies, commodities and
emerging market assets.
"Players are now focused on emerging markets as the credit
crisis takes its toll on them," said Mitsuru Sahara, a senior
manager of foreign exchange sales for Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi
UFJ.
"Nobody is willing to take risks under the current
circumstances, and risk aversion will only accelerate," he said.
The yen may gain the most on the emerging market instability
and as Japanese investors -- insurers, mutual funds and portfolio
managers -- were expected to keep trimming overseas investments,
he said.
Between 2005 and 2007, Japanese investors purchased about
$500 billion of stocks and bonds abroad to make up for low
domestic interest rates and returns.
The dollar fell 1.6 percent against the yen to 95.69 yen,
<JPY=> after tumbling as low as 95.35 yen on trading platform
EBS, the lowest since 1995 when the U.S. currency struck a record
low.
The euro fell 2.6 percent to 122.20 yen <EURJPY=R> after
sliding as low as 121.70 yen, a six-year low.
"The key words are repatriation, risk aversion and emerging
markets," said a senior dealer at a Japanese trading house.
Asian equities slid across the region, dragging down Asian
currencies such as the Korean won <KRW=>, with Tokyo's Nikkei
share average <> plunging below the 8,000 mark to its lowest
point in 5-
