Asian stocks plunge with Wall Street as tech sector surge halted

Asian markets fell deep into negative territory yesterday following painfully deep losses on Wall Street, where the tech sector finally succumbed to profit-taking after months of mindboggling gains.

All three main indexes in New York suffered hefty selling but the tech-heavy Nasdaq led the way with global titans such as Apple, Microsoft, Amazon and Facebook among the worst hit.

And the red ink flooded into Asia yesterday, with tech firms again the whipping boys.

Tokyo, Hong Kong, Seoul, Singapore, Mumbai, Jakarta and Wellington all sank more than one percent, while Sydney dropped more than three percent. Shanghai and Taipei were both off 0.9 percent off. However, London, Paris and Frankfurt edged up in morning trade after Thursday’s plunge.

The drop had been expected after the Nasdaq climbed around 80 percent from its March trough, with analysts warning that valuations were growing increasingly out of sync with economic realities - Tesla has risen nearly 500 percent in the time and Apple more than 120 percent.