It started overseas last night:
TOKYO, Oct. 24 — A recession-driven wave of selling swept across Asian and European markets on Friday amid tumbling corporate profits and a poor growth report from the U.K., while major oil exporting countries agreed to slash output in another concession to the sluggish global economy.
Markets in Asia were off anywhere from 9 to 11 percent, while European exchanges were falling between 7 and and nearly 10 percent. Prices for U.S. stock market futures contracts showed such steep declines that pre-market trading in the S&P 500 was temporarily halted, and both the Dow Jones industrial average and the Nasdaq were approaching those limits. All three pointed to opening losses above 6 percent, with the Dow pointed to drop by an initial 550 points.
And it’s continuing in the American futures markets:
LONDON (CNNMoney.com) — U.S. stock futures tanked early Friday as fears of recession deepened a global market rout.
Dow Jones industrial average futures were down more than 500 points at 5:30 a.m. ET. S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 futures were also down sharply.
Futures measure current index values against the perceived future performance and can indicate how markets open when trading begins in New York.
Concerns that the weak economy will crimp corporate profits pummeled overseas markets. Japan’s Nikkei index tanked 9.6% and European shares plunged about 7% in morning trading.
U.S. markets for the most part managed to overcome the earnings gloom Thursday. The Dow and S&P 500 both advanced while the Nasdaq slipped.
But trading has been volatile lately amid uncertainty about how deep the economic crisis will be and how long it will last.
Hang on for another bumpy ride.
Hi
The figures for the UK economy were truly awful, with a contraction of 0.5% I don’t think there can be any doubt that the UK will endure a prolonged period of negative growth. This is not helped by the fact that the Bank of England waited for too long to cut interest rates and then didn’t cut them by enough.
Neil