The main stock indexes in Japan and Australia declined on Friday amid extremely low activity during the trading session. The markets in China, Hong Kong, and South Korea are still closed due to the holidays.
Meanwhile, the Tokyo Stock Exchange was able to open today after a massive disruption that occurred yesterday. All problems have been fixed, and the system is functioning properly.
However, this did not save stock market indexes in Japan from declining, especially in the light of the country's poor economic results. In particular, the unemployment rate was 3% higher in August compared to the previous month, when a 2.9% decrease was recorded. All this indicates that the crisis is still ongoing and that Japan has not been able to tackle it yet. Moreover, this is the highest unemployment rate recorded in the last three years.
In addition, the new job offers to applicant ratio, a leading indicator for the labor market, decreased in August. Previously there were 108 open vacancies per 100 applicants. Now, there are 104. This has been the lowest level for almost six years.
Japan's Nikkei 225 index dropped by 0.8% today.
The Australian S&P/ASX 200 index plunged by 1.45% in the morning. The statistics here have not been the best lately. Thus, retail sales in the last summer month decreased immediately by 4% compared to the previous reading. This has not happened in the last five months.
The main stock indicators also decreased in Europe this morning. This happened after the American president announced that he tested positive for the coronavirus.
The Stoxx Europe 600 index of large enterprises in the European region declined by 0.41% to 360.32 points.
The UK FTSE 100 Index sank by 0.59%. The German DAX index fell by 0.73%. France's CAC 40 index went down by 0.67%. Italy's FTSE MIB Index lost 0.42%. Spain's IBEX 35 Index dropped by 0.16%, the smallest decline in the region so far.
