On Wednesday, stocks on Wall Street saw a big sell-off, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average, S&P 500 and Nasdaq all dropping.<\/b>
\nAustralia’s market fell sharply in early trade on Thursday, after U. S. stocks sank overnight as a steep decline in tech shares and worries of rapidly rising rates sent Wall Street on pace for its worst day in eight months.
The ASX 200 fell 1.75 percent as of 7:19 a.m. HK\/SIN, with most sectors trading lower. The energy subindex was down 2.6 percent, materials was lower by 2.24 percent and the heavily-weighted financial sector fell 1.47 percent.
Major banking names in the country fell, with Commonwealth Bank shares down 1.06 percent. Mining stocks were also lower, with Rio Tinto down 2.16 percent and BHP off by 2.76 percent.
The Japanese market looked set to open lower as Nikkei futures in Osaka were down 3.2 percent at 22,770. The benchmark Nikkei 225 last closed at 23,506.04.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped by 831.83 points at 25,598.74, the Nasdaq Composite fell 4 percent to 7,422.05. The S&P 500 dropped 3.3 percent to 2,785.68.
Both the Dow and S&P 500 posted their biggest one-day drops since early February, while the Nasdaq notched its largest single day sell-off since June 24,2016.
U. S. futures traded fractionally lower on Thursday morning during Asian hours, with the Dow e-mini futures down 0.22 percent.
Some analysts said that the decline on Wall Street did not appear to have any catalyst, including the ongoing trade friction between the U. S. and China. That has „been ongoing since the start of the year,“ Joseph Capurso, senior currency strategist at the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, wrote in a morning note.
Meanwhile, U. S. President Donald Trump took aim at the Federal Reserve on Wednesday for continuing to raise interest rates despite some recent market turbulence.
„I think the Fed is making a mistake. They are so tight. I think the Fed has gone crazy,“ the president said after walking off Air Force One in Erie, Pennsylvania for a rally.
Commenting on the sell-off on Wall Street, Trump said: „It’s a correction we’ve been waiting for for a long time, but I really disagree with what the Fed is doing.“
The U. S. dollar index, which tracks the greenback against a basket of its peers, last traded at 95.508.
The Japanese yen, considered a safe-haven currency, traded at 112.19 against the dollar, while the Australian dollar was at $0.7061.
\u2014 CNBC’s Fred Imbert contributed to this report.<\/p>\n