Frankfurt DAX: Germany's blue-chip DAX index was pushed lower by a fresh sell-out in Hong Kong, but the market ended near its best levels of the day after the Dow avoided a serious tumble in early trade. The DAX-30 index closed down 1.7 per cent. A firmer dollar also boosted the market.
In later screen-based trade, the IBIS DAX ended at 3,748.88, down 57.78 points or 1.52 per cent.
Dresdner Bank dropped 2.95 per cent after nine-month earnings came in at the lower end of analysts' expectations. Daimler-Benz was off 3.6 points. Dealers said that safety concerns with an A-class model weighed on shares.
"This is a madhouse," said Mr Uwe-Jens Roessel, finance spokesman for the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS), now the smallest party in the German parliament.
Paris CAC-40: French stocks, buoyed by the Dow's rally, recovered some of their losses in late afternoon trade yesterday, to close 2.79 per cent down at 2,739.47 points. The CAC-40 fell below the 2,700 point mark a couple of times in the afternoon, before paring its losses. Traders said the market slump in Brazil was an added worry as several French companies had exposure in the Latin American country, but the Asian crisis remained the main concern. Dealers said that Mr Greenspan's speech on Wednesday had not completely reassured the market, adding that they interpreted his comments as meaning that the Fed would not raise interest rates despite a weakening dollar and that he actually welcomed the effect of the Asian crisis on the markets' speculative bubble.
Milan Mibtel: Italian shares finished weaker across the board yesterday in a nervous market with investors marking down export-oriented companies seen as having the biggest exposure in emerging economies.
But a better than expected performance on Wall Street lifted the market from the day's lows. The all-share Mibtel index closed 2.25 per cent lower at 14,705 and the blue-chip MIB30 was 2.52 per cent down at 21.724. Among the industrials, Pirelli, with extensive interests in Latin America and Asia, took a battering, its shares closing 3.75 per cent lower at 4,290 lire.
Other exporters to take a hammering were clothes maker Benetton, down 4.36 per cent to L23,764, dairy foods maker Parmalat, which ended 4.46 per cent down at L2,355, and Bulgari, which was 3.76 per cent easier at L9,485.
