Spanish bond yields soar, sending US stocks down

Stocks on Wall Street slumped sharply late in the session after fresh worries about about Eurozone debt issues.

Earlier, stocks had bounced from small gains to losses as more favourable jobs data competed for investors' attention with the surge in Spanish bond yields.

At the same time, Fitch Ratings’ report on US banks' exposure continued to dominate market concerns.

At the close (10am NZ time), the Dow Jones Industrial Average had shed 134.86 points, or 1.1%, to 11,770.73.

The S&P 500 index was down 1.7% to 1216.13 and the Nasdaq Composite also lost 1.7%, to 2587.99.

Other markets: Europe down, Asia mixed
European stocks were led lower by banks as Spanish bond yields hit euro-era highs.

The Stoxx Europe 600 Index was 0.7% lower at 235.49. London's FTSE 100 fell 0.7% to 5471.26, Frankfurt's DAX dropped 0.4% to 5887.07 and Paris' CAC-40 was down 0.4% at 3039.51.

Italy's FTSE MIB and Greece's ATHEX were off 0.8%.

Asian stocks ended mixed. Many indexes recovered from losses earlier in the week.

Korea's Kospi rose 1.1% to 1876.67, its first gain in three sessions, while Japan's Nikkei Stock Average edged up 0.2% to 8479.63.

The Australian S&P/ASX 200 index rose 0.3% to 4258.20 but Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index fell 0.8% to 18817.47.

Commodities: Oil dips below $US100
Oil futures briefly dipped below $100 a barrel before bouncing back to levels reached in Wednesday's surge.

Light, sweet crude for December delivery hit a low of $US99.91, before recovering to $US100.50 in New York.

The January Brent crude contract was down $US1.88 at $US109.23 in Europe.

Gold futures retreated as investors moved toward greater cash holdings.

The most actively traded contract, for December delivery, was down $US32.20, or 1.8%, at $US1742.10 an ounce in New York.

The thinly traded front-month November-delivery gold fell $US25.10, or 1.4%, at $US1740.

Currencies: US dollar eases
The US dollar eased slightly against the euro as surging French and Spanish borrowing costs brought talks on central bank intervention.

The euro traded at $US1.3512, off its session highs of $US1.3540 but slightly up from $US1.3463 in late on Wednesday.

The dollar was at ¥77.01, compared with ¥77.07, while the euro was at ¥104.05 compared with ¥103.66.

The UK pound was at $US1.5787 from $US1.5735, and the dollar bought 0.9170 Swiss franc from 0.9196 franc.