Losses on Wall Street were led by a sharp 3.8 per cent fall in the Apple share price as problems with the company’s new smart phones and operating systems spooked investors.

 

The Australian dollar dropped even further overnight after yesterday’s slide of more than a half a cent on news the Reserve Bank of New Zealand views the Kiwi dollar as overvalued.

 

Global figures

Wall Street closed lower yesterday: The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 1.5 per cent to close at 16,946, the S&P 500 lost 1.6 per cent to close at 1,966 and the NASDAQ lost 1.9 per cent to close at 4,467.

 

European markets closed lower: London’s FTSE is down just below 1 per cent, Paris lost 1.5 per cent and Frankfurt is down 1.6 per cent.

 

Asian markets closed mixed: Tokyo’s Nikkei added 1.3 per cent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng is down 0.6 per cent, and China’s Shanghai Composite gained 0.07 per cent.

 

The Australian share market closed higher yesterday: The S&P/ASX 200 Index closed 6 points up to finish at 5,382. On the futures market the SPI is 53 points down. 

 

Turning to currencies and the Australian Dollar at 7:20AM was buying $US0.8789 cents, 53.88 Pence Sterling, 95.57 Yen and 68.95 Euro cents.

 

Company news

 

Shares in Axiom Mining Limited (ASX:AVQ) soared more than 70 per cent yesterday on news it won a long running case over a nickel deposit in the Solomon Islands High Court. 

 

Financial services company Clearview Wealth Limited (ASX:CVW) will extend the offer period for its takeover offer of Matrix Holdings to 10 October. 

 

Commodities

Gold is up $2.40 to $US1,222 an ounce for the December contract on Comex. Silver is down $0.26 to $17.44 for December. Copper is down $0.02 at $3.03 a pound. Oil is down $0.27 at US$92.53 a barrel for November light crude in New York.