2024 Asia stock markets drop sharply after us fall ทำไม

The USD/CHF pair remains confined within a multi-week trading range of 0.8400-0.8575 during the early European trading hours on Friday. ...

07:03 USD/CAD edges lower to near 1.3380 as Crude prices rise, US, UK attacks on Houthis

USD/CAD retraces its recent gains registered in the previous session, edging lower to near 1.3380 during the Asian session on Friday. ...

07:01 Japan Eco Watchers Survey: Outlook fell from previous 49.4 to 49.1 in December

Japan Eco Watchers Survey: Outlook fell from previous 49.4 to 49.1 in December...

07:00 Japan Eco Watchers Survey: Current above expectations (49.9) in December: Actual (50.7)

Japan Eco Watchers Survey: Current above expectations (49.9) in December: Actual (50.7)...

06:17 WTI rises as US, UK attack Iran-backed Houthi’s targets, trades near $73.50

West Texas Intermediate (WTI) US Crude Oil jumped on Thursday after Iran announced the capture of a civilian oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman early in the day. ...

HONG KONG — Stock markets in Asia fell sharply in early trading on Friday after continuing declines on Wall Street and in Europe.

Fears that the fragile economic recovery in the United States might be threatened by the financial and political crisis in Europe gripped Wall Street on Thursday, sending the stock market into a sharp decline and leaving anxious traders wondering where the pain might stop.

The Nikkei 225 index in Japan was off 2.5 percent at noon on Friday, with new strength in the yen hurting exporters. Honda, Toshiba and Hitachi were each down about 4 percent. Toyota, which announced a $50 million agreement on Friday to build electric cars with Tesla Motors in California, was 2.2 percent lower.

The Nikkei was off more than 3 percent at one point on Friday, reaching a five-month low. The index has lost more than 5 percent since Monday.

The Shanghai Composite index dropped nearly 3 percent but rallied to a 0.4-percent decline by the midday break. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index dropped 1.7 percent, hitting a nine-month low; the index has fallen 14 percent in the past five weeks.

Markets in Hong Kong and South Korea were closed on Friday for the holiday that celebrates Buddha’s birthday. And trading in Thailand has been suspended due to the political violence in Bangkok.

The 376-point drop for the Dow Jones industrial average on Thursday punctuated what amounts to a slow-motion crash that began in late April. The Dow has now plunged more than 1,000 points in a matter of weeks, marking what is known as a market correction — a sort of mini-bear market characterized by a 10 percent decline in a short period of time.

With Thursday’s sell-off, this broad decline gained momentum and quickly spread beyond stocks to commodities like copper and oil, which are considered bellwethers of the industrial economy.

As traders downgraded their forecasts for economic growth, the price per barrel of crude oil fell roughly 8 percent in intraday trading, before recovering to end nearly 2 percent lower, at $68.01.

Nagging worries that Europe’s debt crisis could spread, compounded by uncertainties over financial regulation on both sides of the Atlantic, have set investors on edge the world over.

“People are learning to think the unthinkable,” said Willem Buiter, chief economist of Citigroup. Many worry that Greece and even other economically vulnerable nations like Spain or Portugal will be unable to pay their debts despite a sweeping rescue effort by the European Union.

By the close, the Dow was down 376.36 points, or 3.6 percent, at 10,068.01. In a see-saw period of months this year, the index closed at a recent low of 9,908.39 on Feb. 8, climbed to a close of 11,205.03 on April 26, and then fell back by more than 10 percent since then.

The broader Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index closed down 43.46 points, or 3.9 percent, at 1,071.59, the biggest one-day drop since April last year. The Nasdaq composite dropped 4.1 percent.

The unilateral decision by Germany this week to ban certain speculative trading, a move rebuffed by some other European nations, has unsettled investors.

The German government did not consult its partners before issuing the change, adding to the sense that new financial regulations will start arriving piecemeal and that Europe’s leaders are not united in addressing the Continent’s broadening crisis.

“Investors are struggling to adjust to a new regime where politics is more important than before,” said Gianluca Salford, a strategist at JPMorgan Chase in London.

On Thursday evening, the Treasury Department announced that Secretary Timothy F. Geithner would travel to Europe next week to discuss the economic crisis there with Britain’s new chancellor of the exchequer and with the president of the European Central Bank.

The uncertain progress of financial reform in the United States has also weighed on the markets.

Across Wall Street, banking analysts are busy tallying up the financial impact of legislation as it comes up for a Senate vote. Tough new credit card rules have already chipped away at the bottom line of the biggest banks. Now, their derivatives, debit card and proprietary trading businesses could face similarly heavy restrictions under new rules.

A Goldman Sachs research report, released Monday, said the proposed legislation could reduce earnings at 28 of the biggest banks by more than 20 percent.

For the first time there was talk of capital flight from countries like Germany and Britain to perceived safe-havens like Switzerland. And across the globe investors fled from risky currencies, bonds and stocks to safer assets like the dollar, the Japanese yen and United States bonds.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury bond — the benchmark global interest rate — fell to 3.21 percent, its lowest level this year and a clear sign of investors seeking a safe haven.

“There has been a flight to quality — a flight to the dollar, investment grade bonds and even within the stock market toward higher-quality companies,” said Matthew S. Rothman, global head of quantitative equities strategy at Barclays Capital.

There were other reasons for the jitters on Thursday — violence in Thailand, political tensions between North and South Korea, and yet another labor strike in Greece over the proposed austerity measures, all of it adding to the nervousness of investors.

But traders and analysts said the biggest factor unnerving markets was the continuing prospect that European governments might not have done enough to stem the panic over Greece and other heavily indebted nations, and that their problems might spill to the United States, affecting the pace of economic recovery.

Some economists warn, for example, that weakness in Europe’s economies combined with the ongoing appreciation of the dollar against the euro could hurt American exports.

“You are seeing the combined impact of three distinct yet reinforcing factors: greater understanding and concern about the structural headwinds facing markets, a downward reassessment of global growth prospects, and large technical unwinds,” said Mohamed A. El-Erian, chief executive of the bond giant Pimco.

Major American industrial companies whose prospects are intertwined with that of the global economy took a hit to their share prices on Thursday. General Electric, for example, traded almost 6 percent lower, Caterpillar shares were down 4.5 percent and Boeing was off almost 5 percent.

The S.&P. 500 index broke below its 200-day moving average. To technical analysts of the stock market, that was seen as a sure signal of a bearish mood among investors.

“There is no sector that is being spared,” said Anthony Conroy, head equity trader at BNY ConvergEx Group. “You have heard the phrase ‘flight to quality’? We are having a flight to liquidity. Everybody is trying to get liquid. Gold, oil, silver, financials — every sector is getting hit.”

Mr. Buiter of Citigroup said many big investors were questioning whether they could continue to rely on the euro as a safe long-term investment, given Europe’s troubles.

“Many pension funds and other long-term holders have to, for regulatory reasons, hold a fraction of their investments in safe assets. Euro debt used to fit the bill,” he said. “It no longer does. People are wondering about it.”

But some other investors said that despite the market correction there had not yet been a fundamental shift in long-term investment strategies.

Justin Urquhart Stewart, investment director at Seven Investment Management in London, said: “The market is nervous and there has been some selling out, but it’s not capital flight. The euro zone economy is doing better than it was, German exports are strong and corporate earnings are on the up. We have had a one-year bull market in equities, so it’s not surprising to see a pullback.”