Stocks in Europe and Asia mostly fell on Monday after Wall Street recorded its worst week since the pandemic began in 2020.
Stocks fell in Paris, London and Frankfurt but rose in Tokyo. Shanghai was little changed.
Investors are increasingly worried about how aggressively the Federal Reserve, which is holding a policy meeting this week, can act to rein in rising inflation.
Historically low interest rates, dubbed quantitative easing or quantitative easing, have helped support the broader market as the economy suffered a sharp pandemic shock in 2020 and then recovered over the past two years.
The FOMC (Fed) meeting dominates the macro calendar this week and is likely to keep risk attitudes undecided as the end of quantitative easing and imminent rate hikes are likely to be announced," said economists Nicholas Mapa and Robert Carnell of ING in a commentary. .
Germany's DAX index lost 1.1 per cent to 15,431.03 points and the CAC 40 in Paris fell 1.4 per cent to 6,971.19 points. In London, the FTSE 100 fell 0.7 per cent to 7,447.03 points. Futures on the S&P 500 and Dow Industrial added 0.3%.
Some economists believe that the Fed and other central banks need to act faster to reduce price increases by raising rates. US consumer prices rose 7% in December from a year earlier, the biggest increase in almost four decades.
Rising costs have raised fears that consumers will start saving on expenses because of the constant pressure on their wallets. At the same time, outbreaks of the omicron variant of the coronavirus threaten to slow the recovery.
Tokyo's Nikkei 225 index rose 0.2 per cent to 27,588.37 points.
Shares in electronics and energy giant Toshiba Corp. fell 1.6 percent after the company said it was suspending production at a plant in southern Japan that makes semiconductors for cars and cars following a major earthquake in the region.
The Hang Seng in Hong Kong lost 1.2% to 24,656.46. In Australia, the S&P/ASX 200 lost 0.5% to 7,139.50 and India's Sensex fell 2.7% to 57,419.98.
South Korea's Kospi fell 1.5% to 2,792.00 amid strong selling by big tech companies such as Samsung and LG Chemical. Thailand's SET lost 0.7%.
The Shanghai Composite index added less than 0.1% to 3,524.11 points.
On Friday, the benchmark S&P 500 index fell 1.9% to 4397.94 points, down 5.7% for the week, its worst weekly decline since March 2020.
The high-tech-focused Nasdaq composite index fell 2.7% to 13,768.92 points. It has fallen for four consecutive weeks and is now more than 10% below its last high, leading to what Wall Street considers a market correction.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1.3% to 34,265.37 points.
With investors expecting the Fed to start hiking rates immediately after the March meeting, expensive technology stocks and other expensive growth stocks now look relatively less attractive.
If you want to trade and achieve better results you are left with Exness registration on our partners' website.
Treasury yields have fallen as investors turn to safer investments. The yield on 10-year Treasuries fell to 1.73% from 1.76% on Friday.
The Fed's benchmark short-term interest rate is now in a range of 0% to 0.25%. Investors now see an almost 70% probability that the Fed will raise the rate by at least one percentage point by the end of the year, according to CME Group's Fed Watch tool.
In other trading, benchmark US crude rose 21 cents to $85.35 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It fell 41 cents to $85.14 a barrel on Friday.
Brent crude, which is the basis for oil pricing worldwide, rose 26 cents to $88.15 a barrel.
The US dollar fell to 113.62 Japanese yen from 113.68 yen. The euro fell to $1.1327 from $1.1346.
Read also: Oil prices rise as stocks shrink, dispelling Omicron's fears
