Not a good week for US stock markets by any stretch of the imagination. By the end of the week the Dow Jones had fallen by almost 3.5% and the Nasdaq by almost 7.5%. Technology and telecommunications stocks took a massive battering over the week which also affected stocks on the Dow Jones.
Earnings news from the big companies was generally poor, with economic data mixed between better and worse than expected. However, news from the Federal Reserve's Beige Book report said that the US economy was growing and inflation was under control.
The week in the UK was a week of losses, plagued by falls in oil, technology and telecommunications stocks. Bitter sweet news was received on March retails sales with them growing by 5.6% from last March but falling by 0.2% from February's figures.
By the end of the week the FTSE 100 was over 1.5% lower and the FTSE TechMARK was down by almost 4.5%. Over the week in Europe, the Xetra Dax fell by almost 5% and the CAC 40 by almost 3.5%.
Trends were the same all over with falls in oil, technology and telecommunication stocks. In France, the presidential elections moved towards the final votes with socialists and extreme right wingers in third and second place respectively. In Germany the business confidence index had fallen in April, despite analysts predicting growth.
The week in the Far East seemed to buck the trend, with telecommunication stocks sending markets in Japan to all time highs. Whilst the markets fell back towards the end of the week, the outlook is still promising.
Other markets proffered mixed results and it was a short week for Australia and New Zealand, closed on Thursday for a public holiday. Moving back to Japan, unemployment in Japan fell to 5.2% in March from 5.3% in February. This was better than expected. Average spending by households grew but retail sales fell and the consumer price index fell for a fourth year in a row.