Asia and US markets sink while Europe stays calm

Tokyo stocks slumped more than 3%, while losses pushed the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 into negative territory for the year.

The London's FTSE 100 went down 0.9%, however, the fall has still been less severe.

Concerns over corporate profits and slowing growth has rattled investors.

In the US, the Dow Jones Industrial Average sank 2.4% to 24,583.4 points, while the S&P 500 plunged 3.1% to 2,656.1 points on Wednesday.

They underlined other reports suggesting the US housing market is weakening - a worry given the sector is seen as a bellwether of economic health by many.

Wednesday showed that new home sales fell last month to their slowest pace in nearly two years.

Investors have also grown nervous as growth in China slows and companies report increased costs due to labour shortages and tariffs.

In its worst day since 2011, the technology focused Nasdaq dropped 4.4% to 7,108.4 points due to weak corporate profits and global trade tensions.

Even the technology firms, which earlier drove much of the market gains this year did not escape the sell off. Amazon fell 5.9%, Facebook dropped 5.4%, Google parent company Alphabet sunk 4.8% and Netflix 9.4%.

The losses on major European indexes were less severe. The pan-European STOXX 600 fell as much as 1% before paring losses slightly to trade down 0.7%.

Asia and US markets sink while Europe stays calm

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