CNNMoney.com
Companies Economy International Corrections Pre-market Trading After-hours Trading Winners/Losers/Actives Bonds Currencies Commodities World Markets Money Magazine Real Estate Taxes Jobs Ask the Expert Money 101 Autos Mutual Funds The Help Desk Loan Center Best Places to Live Ask the Expert Ultimate Guide to Retirement Retirement Calculators Best Funds Best Places to Retire Fortune Brainstorm Tech Apple 2.0 Blog Big Tech Blog Sectors and Stocks Tech Talk Resource Guide Small Business Makeovers Questions & Answers Small Business Video 100 Best Places to Launch FSB 100 Fortune Small Business Fortune 500 Brainstorm Tech Investing Management C-Suite Rankings Main Create Portfolio Edit Portfolio Create Alerts Edit Alerts
TRADING
CENTER
SPECIAL REPORT

Economic woes weigh on world markets

Concerns about a global recession continue to batter investor sentiment.

EMAIL  |   PRINT  |   SHARE  |   RSS
 
google my aol my msn my yahoo! netvibes
Paste this link into your favorite RSS desktop reader
See all CNNMoney.com RSS FEEDS (close)
By CNNMoney.com staff

LONDON (CNNMoney.com) -- European stock markets posted slight gains Wednesday while Asian shares lost ground as recession fears kept investors cautious.

U.S. stock futures, which offer an indication of how Wall Street will open when trading begins in New York, were narrowly higher.

Lower oil prices and bargain hunters helped support markets in the early going in Europe, but stocks pared gains as investors remained glum about the economy and outlook for corporate profits.

In morning trading, Britain's FTSE 100 and the CAC-40 in France were both up less than 1%. Germany's DAX was about 1% higher.

Economic woes pulled stocks in Asia lower. Japan's Nikkei index fell 1.3%. The KOSPI in Seoul and the Hang Seng index in Hong Kong finished the day with more modest losses.

Fears of recession have swept markets worldwide. In New York on Tuesday, the Dow Jones industrial average, Standard & Poor's 500 index and Nasdaq composite all dropped about 2%.

"Between the automakers and the financials, bad news continues to dominate," said Ryan Detrick, senior technical strategist at Schaeffer's Investment Research.

Investors remain jittery about financial firms, despite the government's $700 billion rescue plan for the sector. Even a new government and mortgage industry plan to help troubled homeowners wasn't enough to help investors overcome their fears Tuesday.

In commodities trading, oil prices fell below $59 a barrel Wednesday. U.S. crude for December delivery was down 60 cents to $58.73 a barrel, after falling as low as $58.55, in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

The dollar gained against the yen and slipped versus the euro. To top of page

Features
Markets Last Change
Dow Jones 10,226.94 203.52 / 2.03%
Nasdaq 2,154.06 41.62 / 1.97%
S&P 500 1,093.08 23.78 / 2.22%
10-year Bond 101 4/32 Yield: 3.48%
U.S.Dollar 1 euro = $1.500 0.015
November 9, 2009 4:03 PM ET
CompanyPrice% Change
Sprint Nextel Corp 3.28 15.09%
Radioshack Corp 20.23 14.04%
TRW Automotive Holdings Corp 22.95 11.46%
Unisys Corp 33.82 9.13%
Nov 9 3:53pm ET †
More Galleries
What I bought with my $8,000 tax credit These 7 new homeowners stepped up their house-hunting to take advantage of the first-time buyer tax credit. More
Then and now: 'The worst slum in America' Charlotte Street in New York City's South Bronx was once world famous for its blight. Now it's a slice of suburbia in the inner city - complete with Beemers and boats. More
Hope for homeowners Critics thought homeownership would never work in the South Bronx. They were wrong. Tour the one house currently for sale on Charlotte Street. More

© 2009 Cable News Network. A Time Warner Company. All Rights Reserved. Terms under which this service is provided to you. Privacy Policy
Copyright © 2009 BigCharts.com Inc. All rights reserved. Please see our Terms of Use.
MarketWatch, the MarketWatch logo, and BigCharts are registered trademarks of MarketWatch, Inc.
Intraday data provided by Interactive Data Real-Time Services and subject to the Terms of Use.
Intraday data is at least 20-minutes delayed. All times are ET.
Historical, current end-of-day data, and splits data provided by Interactive Data Pricing and Reference Data.
Fundamental data provided by Morningstar, Inc..
SEC Filings data provided by Edgar Online Inc..
Earnings data provided by FactSet CallStreet, LLC.