Stocks slump again as January rout rumbles on

Stocks slump again as January rout rumbles on

LONDON- European stocks fell heavily again on Friday as worries about a sudden halt to central bank stimulus and rising tensions between Western powers and Moscow drove one of the worst ever starts to a year for world stock markets.

Strong earnings from Apple provided some encouragement for battered tech and U.S. markets, but traders were struggling to draw a line under a global selloff that has now firmly taken root.

The pan-European STOXX 600 tumbled 1.5% in morning trading, on course for its fourth straight weekly drop, while U.S. futures were pointing to more crimson screens on Wall Street later too.

MSCI's 50-country main world index is now down over 8.1% for the month, which will be its worst January since the 2008 global financial crisis year.

The dollar, meanwhile, is on track for its best week in seven months on bets that U.S. interest rates could now go up as many as five times this year.

"With the Federal Reserve sounding a lot more hawkish, it has shaken the markets," said Jeremy Gatto, a multi-asset portfolio manager at Unigestion in Switzerland.

"Markets can live with rate hikes, but the main question remains around the balance sheet," he added. Markets have been driven up by