Get Ready for Some Economic Stimulus…
With stock sell-offs and Euro crashes. Typical story:
Dow futures fell 553, or 4.57 percent, to 11,553. Standard & Poor's 500 index futures fell 67.20, or 5.07 percent, to 1,258.10. Nasdaq 100 index futures dropped 86.50, or 4.68 percent, to 1,763.00.
In Asia, Japan's Nikkei stock average closed down 5.65 percent—its biggest percentage drop in nearly a decade. Hong Kong's Hang Seng index lost 8.65 percent a day after showing its biggest losses since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
In afternoon trading, Britain's FTSE 100 fell 0.69 percent, Germany's DAX index lost 2.55 percent and, France's CAC-40 fell 1.39 percent.
Some of the more modest moves in major global indexes Tuesday belie the huge drops many saw Monday.
A big question on investors' minds is whether the Federal Reserve, scheduled to meet next week, will make an emergency interest rate cut before then. Traders outside the U.S. were pondering whether other central banks would step in with interest-rate cuts to help shore up market sentiment.
Which leads to the inevitable followup. To wit: 'Stimulus' is the word as economy turns into focus of presidential race.
And the prez hisself is already touting a $150 billion (or therabouts) stimulus package.
In 2006, reason asked, "Can we bank on the fed?"