The Nikkei went into free fall after the open, down over 900 points, and as of this writing has staged a minor recovery to a mere 780 points down and is now down 880 from yesterday’s close. Singapore is down 7%, Australia 6%. The yen is at 99 to the dollar, and gold is at $928 an ounce.
From Bloomberg:
Asian stocks tumbled, driving Japan’s Nikkei 225 Stock Average down as much 11 percent, and U.S. futures fell on concern the deepening credit crisis will push the global economy into recession….
“It’s a financial panic,” said Choi Min Jai, who oversees the equivalent of $2.1 billion at KTB Asset Management Co. in Seoul. “The recession can only get worse. You can’t find the link that will break the vicious cycle.”
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index lost 4.9 percent to 87.86 as of 10:33 a.m. in Tokyo. The measure is poised to drop 16 percent this week, the biggest slump since the index was created on Dec. 31, 1987. Only four stocks gained in the 990 member gauge. S&P 500 index futures lost 2 percent.
All Asian benchmark indexes dropped. Japan’s Nikkei plunged 9.8 percent to 8,264.65. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 Index tumbled 5.7 percent. Today’s slump left the Nikkei valued at 9.9 times earnings and the S&P/ASX 200 at 11 times profit, the lowest for both indexes since at least April 2000, when Bloomberg started keeping track of the data.
Indonesia’s stock exchange is set to resume trading today after a two-day halt. Taiwan is shut for a holiday.
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Yves,
I called my Congressman and pleaded for them to shut down the derivatives market, but what more can a person do at this point but watch? Thanks for your great place here!
I think we will see capitalism morph into something new before XMAS.
“Mother of Mercy, can this be the end of TICo?”
how on earth are you going to shut the derivatives? take a history book and read how they tried that after the tulip mania, how england tried it after the South Sea bubble… and the results. Also if you invalidate the CDS market, then someone who made the correct market move will lose and go bust. Why should the institutions that made the correct market moves go bust before the ones that made a mistake?
Their mistake is they bought unregulated ‘insurance’ against non existing ‘contingent losses’. It’s pure betting. It’s like you win a bet and the person refused to pay you, too bad… I think taking away the CDS casino will go a long way to restoring the financial system quickly for the real economy.
Can we nullify all CDS claims and have the seller repay whatever premiums that had been made? Wouldn’t this clear up a lot of uncertainty hanging over the market in one stroke?