NEW YORK: The UK FTSE 100 slumped 3 percent on Tuesday, its worst one-day fall in over a week, with miners hit hardest after a slump in the manufacturing sector in China – the world’s biggest commodity consumer.
All but one FTSE 100 .FTSE stock closed in negative territory on Tuesday, London’s first trading day of the week after a public holiday on Monday.
Policymakers worldwide have turned more interventionist with a surge in market volatility to levels not seen since the 2008 financial crisis. China’s central bank has already repeatedly intervened to stabilise the yuan since its Aug. 11 devaluation sent shockwaves through global markets.
“We are sellers across the board,” said Mark Ward, head of execution trading at London-based Sanlam Securities. “People are getting back from holidays and trying to make sense of what is going on.
“The China headlines are not helping but I would say it’s probably more down to sentiment than a huge shift in the actual economic outlook.”
The FTSE 100 lagged the pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 .FTEU3, down 2.9 percent.
“As it stands we’ve pretty much wiped off any of the gains we saw last Friday … it does seem like this could be another return to the lows we saw last week, particularly if we don’t see any effects from the Chinese interventions any time soon,” said Brenda Kelly, head analyst at London Capital Group.
