Shares in Toshiba stumbled on Wednesday after the company announced it was writing off more than AU$8.2 Billion and getting out of the business of building nuclear power plants.  A day earlier, chairman Shigenora Shiga announced he was stepping down.

To give an idea of how bad Toshiba's cash flow situation has become, the company said it would consider selling most, even all, of its stake in its prized flash-memory chips business. 

Toshiba executives have come under intense scrutiny because of the financial mess and the years of flawed business decisions that led to it, thus the company is investigating if there was potential inappropriate conduct during its acquisition of nuclear power builder Westinghouse.  No details of any alleged wrongdoing was released.  The Tokyo-based multinational would like to sell all, or part, of its controlling stake in Westinghouse.

"If we can find the right partner, we want to move in that direction," said Satoshi Tsunakawa, Toshiba's president.  "Every possibility is on the table."

Westinghouse had developed an advanced reactor design called the AP1000, and had set a target of selling 45 units globally by 2030.  "But the number will obviously decrease", said Mr. Tsunakawa.