Business News
US stocks plummet as oil hits 140 dollars per barrel (Roundup)
Jun 26, 2008, 23:08 GMT
New York - Major US stock indices posted heavy losses Thursday as the oil price hit a new record Thursday and financial institutions warned that more writedowns were on the horizon.
Oil rose as high as 140.39 dollars per barrel on the day, after Libya threatened to cut its supply and the leader of OPEC said prices will likely rise even further this summer, the Bloomberg financial news agency reported. Crude oil closed just under 140 dollars, up more than 5 per cent.
Stocks on the Dow Jones Industrial Average plummeted more than 350 points and have lost 9.4 per cent since the beginning of this month - the worst June since the Great Depression of 1930, according to Bloomberg.
Goldman Sachs warned that banking giant Citigroup could post another 8.9 billion dollars in mortgage-related writedowns in the second quarter, sparking a broader sell-off of financial shares.
Automaker General Motors suffered its worst one-day drop in three years after Goldman advised investors to sell the stock.
The blue-chip Dow fell 358.41 points, or 3.03 per cent, to 11,453.42. The broader Standard & Poor's 500 dropped 38.82 points, or 2.94 per cent, to 1,283.15. The technology-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index was down 79.89 points, or 3.33 per cent, to 2,321.37.
The US currency dropped against the euro to 63.49 euro cents from 63.82 euro cents on Wednesday. The dollar fell against the Japanese currency to 106.94 yen from 107.87 yen.
Gold surged 32.80 dollars to 915.10 dollars per fine ounce, the highest one-day rise in two years.
COMMENT
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Older Talkback
page: 1
It's them EVIL SPECULATORS! It's them EVIL SPECULATORS! It's them EVIL SPECULATORS!
Ain't that right, Senator McCain? Senator Obama?
If we put Obama's and McCain's brains together in one jar we might have enough to operate a clone of Warren G. Harding.
As for the United States Congress, never will you find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.
I have never seen my government in as sad a shape as it is in today.
we owe our thanks to one man for this mess.
we know who that one asshole er man is don't we......
Pray tell Bob, who might that man be?
Noharness - do you mean to say that you do NOT think speculation is driving this market? Has world consumption increased 200-300% since last year? I doubt it. With a weak dollar and slowing global economy, pumping money into oil seems like a good bet.
Ban speculation and trade in paper barrels and the price will drop immediately. It will tank. Heh heh.
Oh wait, then we will have to bail out the speculators who got burned in the housing market, then got burned while they were skinning us with oil prices.
'Let'em burn.'
page: 1
NoharnessJun 26th, 2008 - 23:48:09
It's them EVIL SPECULATORS! It's them EVIL SPECULATOR! It's them EVIL SPECULATORS!
Ain't that right, Senator McCain? Senator Obama?
If we put Obama's and McCain's together in one jar we might have enough to operate a clone of Warren G. Harding.
As for the United States Congress, never will you find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.
I have never seen my government in as sad a shape as it is in today.
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