HONG KONG (AP) -- Asian stock markets sank Monday, with Japan's benchmark tumbling to a 26-year closing low, amid deepening anxiety that economies in the U.S. and elsewhere will take far longer to emerge from recession.
Investors continued to shun banks on worries they still haven't raised enough capital to make up for their colossal losses. Heavyweight bank HSBC, Europe's biggest, tumbled over 12 percent Hong Kong trade.
Japanese shares, already among Asia's worst performing this year, crumbled to a 26-year low after the world's second-largest economy posted a record current account deficit in January. Oil prices, meanwhile, were higher ahead of an anticipated production cut from OPEC.
Recent losses in Asian markets, while somewhat tame compared to those in the West, have still been severe as investors ratchet down their expectation for global growth in the face of abysmal economic data and signs of ongoing struggles at banks and major firms like General Motors.
"Sentiment is terrible," said Ben Pedley, managing director of LGT Investment Management Ltd. in Hong Kong. "We're going to be in a funk, not only in Asia, but in the rest of the world for the next year or two." more...
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