Euro, Asian Markets Continue Selloff
August 9, 2011 by UPI - United Press International, Inc.
NEW YORK, Aug. 9 (UPI) — European and Asian stocks plunged Tuesday ahead of Wall Street’s opening bell in a rampant global selloff on Europe’s debt crisis and the U.S. credit downgrade.
British, German and French stock indexes fell more than 2 percent in early-morning trading following daylong gyrations in Asian markets.
In late-afternoon trading Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index was down nearly 3 percent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index was down more than 4 percent and Australia’s Standard & Poor’s/ASX 200 index down more than 3 percent.
Taiwan’s TAIEX traded nearly unchanged, recovering from a 5 percent loss earlier in the day.
Futures on the U.S. S&P 500 index were about 2 percent lower early Tuesday EDT.
The U.S. dollar fell against the Japanese yen and the euro.
The price of gold — considered a safe haven at times of uncertainty — jumped to another record high of about $1,758 a troy ounce.
Oil dropped about $3 to about $78 a barrel.
The Dow Jones industrial average fell 634 points, or 5.6 percent, Monday and the S&P 500-stock index dropped 6.7 percent, the biggest retreats since December 2008 in the midst of the financial crisis.
About $7.8 trillion has been wiped away in global stock markets in the past 10 trading days.
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