World Stocks Slide As Economic Recovery Hopes Wane

Stock markets have rallied over the last three months, and as equities usually start rising 6 to 9 months before actual recovery emerges in the official economic data, this suggests investors believe the massive sell-off in markets during the most acute phase of the financial crisis was overdone. Some of the world's major equity indexes are now in positive territory for 2009.

Earlier in Asia, Japan's Nikkei 225 stock average lost 96.15 points, or 1 percent, to 10,039.67 — on Friday, the index finished above the psychologically important 10,000-point level for the first time since October 7, 2008. And Hong Kong's Hang Seng slipped 390.72 points, or 2.1 percent, to 18,498.96.

Elsewhere in Asia, China's Shanghai index bucked the regional trend to rise 1.7 percent to 2,789.55 while Singapore's market fell 2.3 percent and Taiwan's benchmark dived 3.5 percent. South Korea's ended 1.1 percent down at 1,412.42.

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AP Business Writer Yuri Kageyama in Tokyo contributed to this report.