Asian equities were shaky on Wednesday, 26 December 2018, following a Christmas eve Wall Street plunge, as investors were unnerved by US political developments including a US federal government shutdown and President Donald Trump's hostile stance towards the Federal Reserve chairman. MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan dipped 0.1%.
Global stock markets were heading into the year-end under a heavy cloud after another rout this week as US political uncertainty added to heightened concerns over slowing global economic momentum.
Japan's Nikkei bounced 1.8% after diving 5% the previous day to a 20-month low and slipping into bear market territory.
The S&P 500 tumbled to the brink of a bear market on Monday as US stocks extended their steep sell-off in a pre-holiday shortened session, with investors rattled by the US Treasury secretary's convening of a crisis group and by other political developments. All three major indexes ended down more than 2% the day before the Christmas holiday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 653.17 points, or 2.91%, to 21,792.2, the S&P 500 lost 65.52 points, or 2.71%, to 2,351.1 and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 140.08 points, or 2.21%, to 6,192.92. Last week, the S&P 500 suffered its biggest weekly%age drop since August 2011, while the Dow had its biggest weekly drop since October 2008. The S&P 500 finished about 19.8% below its September 20 closing high, just shy of the 20% threshold commonly used to define a bear market.
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin called top US bankers on Sunday amid the pullback in stocks and said he was calling a meeting of financial regulators to discuss ways to ensure normal market operations. Investors also were grappling with the federal government shutdown and reports that President Donald Trump privately discussed the possibility of firing the Federal Reserve chairman.
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