[posting]30972948[/posting]Vielen könnte das Lachen noch vergehen, vor allem denen,
die 2000 noch nicht an der Börse aktiv waren...
AP
Stocks Fluctuate Amid Home Loan Jitters
Wednesday August 1, 3:10 pm ET
By Tim Paradis, AP Business Writer
Stocks Zigzag As Wall Street Faces Concerns on Home Loans, Credit Market
NEW YORK (AP) -- Wall Street careened through a difficult session Wednesday, changing directions several times as investors were beset by ongoing concerns about U.S. home loans and the credit market.
Stocks had for a time seemed to be holding their gains, but the market resumed its zigzags, suggesting that any advance was perhaps tenuous and could be punctured by further bad news about soured subprime home loans, those made to borrowers with poor credit.
The back-and-forth session revealed the fractious nature of the stock market after a series of triple-digit swings in the Dow Jones industrials over the past week. On Tuesday, Wall Street gave back a big early gain and resumed the sharp slide it began last week, as concerns about home loan defaults and their fallout re-emerged when American Home Mortgage Investment Corp. reported troubles with its credit lines.
Economic news -- including a better-than-expected report on pending home sales -- as well as record oil prices failed to peel investors' focus from credit.
"We've got a tug-of-war going on," said Arthur Hogan, chief market analyst at Jefferies & Co. He contends Wednesday's trading represents a microcosm of the market's performance of recent weeks, when investors alternately focus on concerns like subprime loans and rising energy prices and positives like low unemployment, low interest rates and corporate profits.
AP
U.S. Crisis Sends World Markets Tumbling
Wednesday August 1, 12:38 pm ET
By Matt Moore, AP Business Writer
European, Asian Markets Fall Again, Spurred by Mounting Fears Over U.S. Subprime Market Crisis
FRANKFURT, Germany (AP) -- European and Asian markets tumbled again Wednesday, spurred by mounting fears that the crisis in the U.S. subprime market could start engulfing banks and other companies around the world.
In Germany, the DAX-30 Index fell 1.5 percent to close at 7,473.93 as banking stocks slid on news that American Home Mortgage Investment Corp. had missed margin calls from its lenders and was mulling several options, including the strategic liquidation of its assets.
The company said the turbulent conditions in the mortgage market forced it to mark down the value of its portfolio of home loans and loan-backed bonds.
That caused shares to drop as persistent concerns that woes in the U.S. housing loan market could spread and drag on global growth. The U.K. FTSE 100 index fell 1.7 percent to 6,250.60 and the French CAC-40 index lost 1.7 percent to 5,654.30.
In Asia, Japanese stocks sank 2.2 percent to a four-and-half-month low, Hong Kong's market fell 3.2 percent, and South Korean shares plunged 4 percent. Indian stocks also sank 4 percent.
Chinese stocks, which had shrugged off the global market turmoil until now, retreated from record highs. The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index fell 3.8 percent.
Jimmy Yates, a dealer at CMC Markets in London, said the drop in European markets was due to the subprime mortgage crisis in the United States, particularly in the wake of Tuesday's announcement by American Home Mortgage.
"A lot of this stuff has been talked about and now people are starting to really factor it in and thinking it could have an effect on GDP and a U.S. slowdown," Yates told The Associated Press. "The knockdown effect on the global economy can never be discounted."
He said traders are curious and cautious about what kind of amounts of money could be involved, adding that some estimates have run as high as US$250 billion (euro182.98 billion).
"No one knows what kind of effect it's going to have," he said. "We could be talking massive amounts of money."
