Fed's Rate Cut Spurs Rallies in Asia, Americas; Indonesia, Singapore, Philippines, Brazil Jump
Tuesday's quarter-point cut in U.S. interest rates continued to underpin a rally in many of the world's stock markets, driving the Dow Jones World Stock Index up 0.34 point, or 0.18%, to 189.36.</br></br>Stocks in Asia and the Americas, in particular, welcomed the rate cut as likely paving the way for lower domestic interest rates in emerging markets. Hong Kong initially rallied 2%, but gave up a lot of the gains to end just 0.6% higher. Elsewhere, the Philippines was up 2.3%, Indonesia up 3.9%, Singapore up 2.9%, and Japan up 1.3%.</br></br>In the Americas, Brazil continued its rallying streak to close up 2.6%, benefiting from last week's news of a big financial rescue package and Tuesday's U.S. rate cut. The Bank of Canada yesterday followed the Fed's easing with a cut in its key rate, but the move failed to inspire Canadian stocks, which rose just 0.1%.</br></br>European markets ended mixed, with Sweden up 1.9%, Switzerland up 0.9% and France up 0.3%, while decliners included Germany, down 0.4%, and London, down 0.5%.</br></br>In Asia on Thursday, Tokyo closed the morning session down 0.5%, while South Korea was up 0.9% at midday. In early dealings, Indonesia had jumped 1.7%, Hong Kong had gained about 1%, but Malaysia was down 1.3%.