The Dax closed 85 points lower at 5,702, the Cac lost 67 points to 3,760 and the Swiss Market index shed 82 points to close at 6,286. The Dow Jones industrial average dropped 93.87 points, to end at 10,332.44. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index fell 14.90 points, to 1,094.90. The Nasdaq Composite Index dropped 36.32 points, or 1.66 percent, to 2,156.82. The Nikkei fell 51.79 points to a four-month closing low of 9,497.68. The Topix index edged up 0.1 percent to 838.71.

Companies in Europe are setting increasingly ambitious growth targets for emerging markets, three of the continents biggest names aiming to source half their revenues from them within six years. European Union leaders on Thursday night awarded two of its top jobs to politicians relatively unknown on the international stage, after almost a decade of wrangling over how to project Europe’s global presence. At a Brussels summit the EU picked consensus builders rather than star names, choosing Herman Van Rompuy, Belgium’s centre-right prime minister, over Tony Blair as the EU’s first full-time president, the FT reports.

Due for release today is the JPY Bank of Japan Interest Rate Decision, NZD Credit Card Spending and NZD Credit Card Spending.

By Greg Secker

This entry was posted on November 20, 2009 at 9:49 am. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Posted in Greg's Commentary by Greg No Comments Yet