(News Bulletin 247) – The Paris Stock Exchange plunged by 2.5% in early trading on Monday. Markets fear a recession in the world’s largest economy after the publication of deteriorating statistics last week.

The Paris Stock Exchange started the week with a sharp decline. Its flagship index, the CAC 40, plunged by 2.5% in early trading, to 7,072.42 points.

On Friday, the leading Paris index had already fallen 1.6% to close at its lowest level of the year following a disappointing US employment report.

Elsewhere in Europe, the Dax plunged by 2.9% in Frankfurt, the FTSE 100 in London stumbled by 2.3% while the pan-European Stoxx Europe 600 index dropped by 3.2% this Monday morning.

Nervousness has risen again as bad news from the Atlantic accumulates, fueling fears of a slowdown in the American economy. At the end of last week, operators had indeed become aware of a weakening of the labor market and a deterioration in manufacturing activity in the United States.

Unsurprisingly, US indices took a hit after multiple negative signals on the health of the country’s economy. The Dow Jones returned 1.61%, the S&P returned 1.90%, while the Nasdaq Composite fell 2.53%. The leading index of technology stocks is down 10% from its closing high in July, which puts it in a “technical correction”.

Stock market crash in Asia

In Asia, operators were only able to react on Monday to the American employment figures published on Friday. On the Tokyo Stock Exchange, the Nikkei index lost 12.4% on Monday to 31,458.42 points, suffering its biggest drop in a single session. This is its biggest decline since “Black Monday” on October 20, 1987, according to LSEG data cited by Reuters.

In Seoul, the Kospi fell nearly 8.8% at the close, and trading was briefly suspended as circuit breakers were activated, according to the Korean news agency Yonhap.

“There are simply too many fires to put out, making a possible recovery on Monday a pipe dream – especially with resurgent US recession fears and the looming spectre of a hard landing chilling global investors to the bone,” Stephen Innes of SPI Asset Management was quoted as saying by AFP.

Indicators related to eagerly awaited services

It is in this very heavy context that investors will take note this Monday of a series of activity indicators in services on both sides of the Atlantic. In Europe, the PMI services will be published in the morning, when the ISM services index will be known in the United States in the early afternoon.

On the value side, none escaped this downward movement. Bottom line this Monday morning was STMicroelectronics, which fell by 5%, followed by Teleperformance (-4.6%) and Renault (-4.3%).