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Market indices settle low

18 September 2008 09:17 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Vugar Mustafayev - APA-Economics. The U.S. benchmark indexes plunge between 4% and 5% as nervous investors increasingly are afraid to take additional risk. Gold and silver jumped with falling confidence in central bankers around the world.
The turmoil spread to Russia which closed its two main stock markets for a second day as shares dived and officials pledged 44 billion dollars to fight collapsing investor confidence.
Dow Jones Industrial Average decreased 449.36 or 4.06% to a close of 10,609.66, S&P 500 Index closed down 57.21 or 4.71% to 1,156.39, and Nasdaq Composite Index decreased 109.05 or 4.94% to close at 2,098.85. In Toronto TSX Composite closed down 349.30 or 2.86% to 11,877.69.
Homebuilders fell after the housing starts dropped 6.2% to a nearly two-decade low. Crude oil surged after the release of weekly inventories data.
Of the 30 stocks in Dow Jones Industrial Average all declined.
AIG led decliners in Dow Jones Industrial Average with a fall of 45.33% followed by losses in JP Morgan Chase of 12.20%, in Citigroup of 10.92%, in American Express of 8.4% and in General Motors of 8.4%.
Of the stocks in S&P 500 index, 21 increased, 478 declined and none was unchanged. Of the index stocks, 5 rose more than 3% and 365 fell more than 3%.
SanDisk Corp led the gainers in the S&P 500 index with a rise of 39.10% followed by gains in Newmont Mining of 9.4%, in Monster Worldwide of 6.6%, in Range Resources 4.9%, in Nvidia Corp of 4.3% and in Baker Hughes of 2.3%.
Samsung Electronics the maker of memory cards launched a hostile tender offer at $26 a share for SanDisk. The hostile offer values the company at $5.9 billion. The company rejected the offer and said that it undervalues the company.
AIG led decliners in the S&P 500 index with a plunge of 45.33% followed by losses in Genworth Financial of 25.8%, in Morgan Stanley of 21.75%, in Wachovia Corp of 20.76%, in Constellation Energy of 19.47%, in Dynegy Inc of 18.8% and in Sovereign Bancorp of 16.9%.
FTSE 100 Index closed lower 178.60 or 3.43% to 5,025.60, in Paris CAC 40 Index decreased 81.57 or 1.96% to close at 4,087.40 and in Frankfurt DAX index lower 98.99 or 1.63% to close at 5,965.17. Euro was trading at $1.4387.