Stocks on Wall Street have fallen on investor concerns about China and Ireland, which offset strong quarterly results and upbeat forecasts from major retailers Wal-Mart and Home Depot.
The Dow Jones Index was down 198 points to 11,004.
The Nasdaq Composite was down 44 points to 2470.
In Europe: the FTSE in London was down 2.4%, the DAX in Frankfurt was down 1.9% and CAC-40 in Paris was down 2.6 percent
In Tokyo, the Nikkei Index fell 30 points to 9797.
Across the Tasman, the Australian 200 Index rose 12 points to 4700.
The NZX 50 fell 13 points to close at 33 15 on turnover of $90 million.
At 8.25am on Wednesday, the New Zealand dollar was trading at 76.63 US cents, 78.66 Australian cents, 48.28 pence, 63.84 yen and 0.5682 euro. The Trade Weighted Index was at 69.02.
Brent crude oil was trading at $US84.41 per barrel and gold was trading at $US1333.50 per ounce.
