26 Sep 2011

Bad week for markets

8:50 am on 26 September 2011

Last week on Wall St was the worst since the depths of the financial crisis in 2008 for the Dow Jones industrial average.

The Dow dipped 6.4% and the Nasdaq lost 5.3%.

Investors are worried about a failure of policymakers to arrest global economic stagnation.

Overall, the Dow Jones Index rose 38 points, or 0.3% on Friday, to close 10,771. The Nasdaq Composite was up 28 points, or 1.1%, to 2483.

In Europe: the FTSE 100 in London rose 0.5%, the CAC-40 in Paris was up 1% and DAX in Frankfurt rose 0.6%.

The Nikkei in Japan fell 181 points to 8560.

The Australian 200 Index fell 62 points, or 1.6%, to 3903 and the NZX 50 fell 30 points, or 0.9 percent, to close at 3283.

At 8.25am on Monday, the New Zealand dollar was trading at 78.13 US cents, 79.92 Australian cents, 50.85 pence, 59.62 yen and 0.5797 euro. The Trade Weighted Index was at 69.61.

Brent crude oil was trading at $US111.47 per barrel and gold was trading at $US1655.29 per ounce.