Overnight markets: Down

Asian stocks remained under pressure amid the persisting stalemate in talks over raising the US debt ceiling, with poor earnings putting extra weight on Japanese technology shares.  Sony and Nintendo the biggest drags on the regional index as investors vented disappointment over their earnings reports. Nintendo was down 18.6 per cent in Osaka trade, the most in 20 years, after it cut the price of its 3DS handheld game console by up to 40 per cent as poor sales led to a Y25bn quarterly loss. The maker of the Wii computer games also slashed its profit forecast on Thursday. Sony slid 1.9 per cent after reporting a net loss in the fiscal first quarter and slashing its full-year earnings target. Panasonic retreated 0.9 per cent and Toshiba was off 1.5 per cent after reporting heavy earnings declines. TDK Corp dipped 5.3 per cent as the world’s largest maker of magnetic heads for disk drives by sales posted an 83 per cent profit drop.

Asian markets

Nikkei 225 down -38.70 (-0.39%) at 9,863

Topix down -4.17 (-0.49%) at 844.20

Hang Seng down -163.73 (-0.73%) at 22,407

US markets

S&P 500 down -4.22 (-0.32%) at 1,301

DJIA down -62.44 (-0.51%) at 12,240

Nasdaq up +1.46 (+0.05%) at 2,766

European markets

Eurofirst 300 up +0.51 (+0.05%) at 1,089

FTSE100 up +16.63 (+0.28%) at 5,873

CAC 40 down -21.41 (-0.57%) at 3,713

Dax down -62.62 (-0.86%) at 7,190

Currencies

€/$ 1.43 (1.43)

$/¥ 77.49 (77.66)

£/$ 1.64 (1.64)

Commodities ($)

Brent Crude (ICE) up +0.21 at 117.57

Light Crude (Nymex) down -0.29 at 97.15

100 Oz Gold (Comex) up +0.90 at 1,614

Copper (Comex) up +1.30 at 447.75

10-year government bond yields (%)

US 2.96

UK 2.97

Germany 2.64

CDS (closing levels)

Markit iTraxx SovX Western Europe -4bps at 264.3bp

Markit iTraxx Europe -1.58bps at 114.3bp

Markit iTraxx Xover -6.09bps at 429.9bp

Markit CDX IG -0.35bps at 95.84bp

Sources: FT, Bloomberg, Markit