ending yet another rough day. the dow plunging 391 points as worries of a global economic slowdown and europe's ongoing debt crisis led to a major selloff. the dow has fallen 674 points in the last two sessions. the biggest two-day drop in nearly three years and just a few hours ago, the republican-controlled house passed a temporary spending bill to keep the government running. it now goes to the senate where it wl likely fail raising concerns of a possible government shutdown one week from today. meantime, facing tough opposition is capitol hill, the president took his $447 billion jobs plan on the road demanding action on the home turf of two of his biggest g.o.p. rivals. and sparks were flying last night in florida as those vying to replace the president went at it again in the latest republican debate. busy morning. good morning. i'm ashley webster. this is a fox business network special report. thank you for joining us. all eyes again on global

financial markets both here in the u.s. and around the world and my, oh, my, what a day yesterday. a huge selloff. let's look at the numbers for you. the dow jones industrial average down at the day for 391 points. at one point below 500 points. but coming back to 391. down 3 1/2% on the dow. nasdaq down 3 1/4%. s&p losing 3700 points or more than 3%. what can we expect today on wall street? at this hour, the future boards showing green. the dow up 1/2%. and the nasdaq showing upward arrows up about 1/2%. what's been going on while you've been sleeping? well, in asia, certainly red arrows and probably the worst performing market, south korea down nearly 6%. not such big losses in china and hong kong down 1 1/3%. the shanghai down .4%. probably the best performing market in asia.

in the past few days, the dow has fallen a whopping 675 points. it is the biggest margin since the height of the financial fallout back in 2008. joining us now is fox business' lauren simeneti, what is behind the steep nose dive in the market? >> good morning. here we are again three years later talking about much of the same issues. i guess the answer to your question is what didn't cause that huge nose dive yesterday in the markets? i guess you can call with contraction in the manufacturing sector in china, the world's second largest economy. that got many investors nervous idea and there was an encore basically to that report showing that the 17 nations that make up the euro zone, the area that's in such a debt crisis right now had a contraction in their business activity as well. well, when it was time for the u.s. markets to open, they opened sharply to the down side and basically stayed there all day. at one point yesterday, the dow was down 527 points. so you can say we rallied back

in the final few minutes to close down just 391 points but the selloff was fierce and it was very sharp indeed. many people are nervous about a host of issues right now particularly those dealing with this fear that we might dip back into a second recession. a double dip global recession and that's what nobody wants to see. the difference between right now and 2008, ashley, is that europe is driving the bus as we're speaking because their debt crisis and the spread of that contagion sparked yesterday when we heard the financial times report that 16 european banks and countries as far as cyprus and slovenia might need more money got people even more nervous. what happened? investors flocked to the good old united states of america, the u.s. dollar soared yesterday. people cashed out of their gold positions. imagine that, on a jittery day, selling gold because you want cold, hard cash. and that's exactly what we saw. also, people put their money in

the treasury market, the 10-year treasury yields hitting new lows that we've seen. so that's what's going on. fortunately, some green on the scen this morning. >> thank you very much. what's been going on in europe? big selloff on thursday but maybe seeing green on the screen, perhaps not that much but stablizing at least. in paris, also up 7 points. 1/4% gain. the dax index up a third. all the indices losing 3%, 4%, 5 hers yesterday. at least we've stopped the bleeding at least for now. for more analysis on the european markets i'm joined by david qou of the monthly fall u.k. he's live in london. thank you so much for joining us. here we go again. what's your explanation for the latest big selloff? do the markets believe we're headed towards another global recession? >> well, i think yesterday,

ashley, was just a feeling of frustration, desperation, and people -- and a bit of irritation thrown in as well. and i think investors were just saying we've had enough. we're taking it and we're going home and maybe we'll come back another day. they're more or less echoing all the leaders at the moment. we're talking about the professional leaders like those from the imf, the ecb, the world bank and david cameron. they are just getting increasingly more irritated with europe. and they're saying what exactly are you trying to sort of do? why aren't you solving this problem? and the analogy i like to use, ashley, is a bit like you and i looking through the windows of somebody's house and we see the husband and wife arguing. they're arguing over what they're going to have for dinner. meanwhile, the bailiffs are coming in and taking the cooker away and what you cook for dinner becomes irrelevant because you don't have anything to cook with anymore. this is the situation with europe. they're saying sort this problem about greece out because until you sort it out, it's going to infect europe, it's going to infect america. it's going to infect also asia and china is getting irritated

now and that is quite dangerous. >> yeah, and you know, moody's down grading more greek banks. so what? we know the situation isn't good there. it appears we're grinding towards a greek default, would you agree? >> i think we are heading towards that direction and i think europe is not doing anything because they don't know what to do. and it's a bit like, you know, having a mosquito spoiling your picnic. what you need to do is you spray the mosquito and then you get rid of it and then hopefully everybody can sit down and enjoy what is likely to be a good picnic. and greece is the problem. greece is the word and they need to do something about greece. until they actually do, it i think we'll be in a mess for a long time. >> what about these french banks, david? their exposure to not only greek debt but the italian, spanish, portuguese and so on. how concerned are you about the exposure of these big french banks? >> well, it's not just me that is concerned about them. there was a report that came out

yesterday that said that lloyd insurance company, lloyd's of london insurers, they are reluctant to put their money into certain peripheral banks. they didn't exactly say which ones they were but i think we can have a pretty good guess as to which ones they might be. and if you get an insurance company like lloyd's saying we're not really sure where we're going to be putting our money, where we're going to be depositing our money, then i think you have a problem. christine legard hinted at the problem and said the banks need to be capitalizing properly and they need to draw on the money from the european stress fund and that needs to be put into the banks in some ways. she's really stating the obvious, banks need to be recapitalized just in case anything were to happen to greece and that would mean that the banks suddenly run out in liquidity. >> the best news is it's the weekend tomorrow. david kuo, as always, thank you so much for talking with us today. we appreciate it. >> thank you. >> all right. let's take a look at these

commodities as we saw yesterday. broad selloff across all sectors including commodities and my, oh, my, let's take a look at oil. crude oil right now, texas oil at $81. up just a little bit. just a tick about $0.50, up about 6 --.6%. commodities did take a beating as the market plunged yesterday. saunder smith gives us the details. >> this year's gains for commodities now gone. the fed's bleak economic outlook weighing on commodities across the board in thursday's session. in fact, copper seeing its biggest selloff in years. that of course, an industrial metal heavily -- heavily tied to construction. and if there is slowing global demand, there could be lower copper prices. oil also seeing big selling in thursday's session falling 6 bucks. it did fall at one point below

$80 a barrel but closed just above there, many traders saying if the economic concerns continue, we could see new levels in the 70's for oil. wheat and other food commodities falling. wheat fell to its lowest level in months. again, more concerns about slowly global demand, not just for the industrial metals, not just for gasoline but for the food commodities and then finally, one everybody is watching, gold plunging in thursday's session and actually erasing the last month of gains for the yellow metal. and where were all the dollars flowing? well, into the u.s. dollars, the safe haven that some see the u.s. dollar, the currency as certainly was getting a lot of attention after the fed's move but it's not just about the fed traders here in chicago but about the ongoing crisis in europe slowing demand from china, all of this and the political uneasiness here in the united states, all of this weighing on markets across the board. again, the only thing in the green was the green back itself. likely to be another wild ride

in chicago, on friday, we'll see you the rest of the day on the fox business network. back to you. >> thank you very much. that was fox business' very own sandra smith at the cme, dollar down slightly against the euro and british pound but strong day for the dollar yesterday. some of the other business headlines making news this morning, let's check in with diane in our fox business headquarters with the latest. >> good morning. stocks are getting a boost this morning after members of the g-20 vowed to work together to bolster the struggling global economy. in a statement, the group says it's "committed to a strong and coordinated international response to address the renewed challenges facing the global economy." it says the main issues at hand are sovereign stresses, weak economic growth and high unemployment. the house has approved legislation to keep the government from shutting down. the bill also includes $3.7 billion in disaster aid. republicans were able to get it through on a narrow vote, just 219-203. but even before it passed the house, senate majority leader

harry reid already said the bill will be rejected in the senate. hewlett-packard has named meg whitman as its new president and chief executive. she replaces louis apitaker who took a lot of heat as h.p. stock plunged under his leadership. before running for governor of whitman, she was the ceo of ebay. it fell in after hours trading. back to you. >> thank you very much. last night in florida, the top republican presidential contenders were at it again in a spirited debate. fox news correspondent craig boswell has the story. >> republican presidential hopefuls face each other for the third time in three weeks, all trying to gain momentum during a two-hour debate. the candidates are courting florida voters but they're making their case to a national audience. >> i'm not for taking them out of the region. i believe we need to listen to our generals and our generals are being very, very clear. >> i believe that, after 10 years of fighting the war on terror, people are ready to bring our troops home from afghanistan, rick, they're ready

to bring our troops home. >> tea party backed candidate michelle bachmann comes into the contest looking to gain momentum. >> i think you earned every dollar, you should get to keep every dollar that you earn. that's your money. that's not the government's money. >> all of the candidates know florida is where they need to distinguish themselves from the others. >> unlike governor romney's plan, my plan throws out the old one, he's still hooked to the current tax code. that dog won't hunt. >> romney is in a tight race for the top spot in the contest. the latest quinnipiac survey shows him trailing behind texas governor rick perry by nine points both taking jabs at each other. on >> it's not the first time that mitt has been wrong on issues before. >> it's different than what the governor has put in your book six months ago. you better find that rick perry and get him to stop saying that. >> your hard copy book, you said that it was exactly what the american people needed to have that romney care given to them as you had in

massachusetts. then in your paperback, you took that line out so speaking of not getting it straight in your book, sir, that would be a good one. >> i wrote my book and in my book i said no such thing. >> it's fine for you to retreat from your own words in your own book but please don't make me retreat from the words that i wrote in my book. >> this florida debate is a chance for candidates to gain that momentum and momentum means money and saturday's straw poll will be an indication of how they perform. >> that was fox news' craig boswell in orlando in the republican debate last night. in an effort to push his jobs plan to the top two republicans, he positioned himself at a bridge in the middle of ohio and kentucky, home states of speaker of the house john boehner and senate republican leader mitch mcconnell. obama urged the republicans to pass the bill to rebuild this bridge and rebuild america. but the president faces an uphill battle in getting the $447 billion plan passed in congress.

delegations from the united states and other western countries walked out of the u.n. general assembly during iranian president mahmoud ahmadinejad's speech yesterday. in his address, ahmadinejad said the 9/11 attacks were a pretext for the wars on iraq and afghanistan. he also blamed the u.s. for several global problems including the financial crisis. the already strained relationship between the u.s. and pakistan is getting even more shaky. joint chiefs of staff admiral mike mullin accusing pakistan's intelligence service of aiding attacks on the u.s., most recently at his embassy in kabul and a truck bombing that wounded 77 american soldiers. pakistan dismissed those claims and warned the u.s. is risking losing pakistan as an ally. after 16 years on death row, an alabama man has been put to death by lethal injection after the supreme court denied his appeal. derek o'neill mason was convicted of shooting a store clerk in 1994. mason is the third person to be

executed in the u.s. this week. and the 36th inmate executed in the u.s. this year. mason said he was fasting and did not request a last meal. in texas, death row inmates will no longer have the privilege of requesting a last meal. prison officials made that change after lawrence russell brewer who was executed wednesday requested two chicken fried steaks, a triple meat bacon cheeseburger, a pound of barbecue. fried okra, three fajitas, a meat lovers pizza, pint of ice cream and peanut butter fudge but ate none of it. jaycee duguard is suing the federal government for failing to monitor the person who kidnapped her and held her for years. he was on parole and under federal supervision when he kidnapped dugard in 1991. her lawyers said had federal parole officers done their job, dugard would not have to endure

nearly two decades of captivity. scientists think today is the day a bus sized satellite will plunge back to earth. most of the satellite expected to burn up in the atmosphere but pieces totalling about 1/2 ton are expected to crash to earth somewhere. nasa says the debris will miss north america and the odds of anyone being hurt by falling debris are very slim. we hope they're right. all right. we'll take a break right now but when we come back, the very latest market numbers from around the globe. also, nicole will tell us the reasons behind yesterday's major selloff on wall street. this is the fox business network special report.

>> welcome back, everybody. here with the ugly details from

yesterday, dow off 391 points and the nasdaq down 3 1/4% and the s&p down 37 points or more than 3%. what can we expect today? at this hour, the futures board showing green arrows, dow up 73 points, up .6% and the s&p up 9 points. nasdaq up about .7%. meantime, in europe, we've stopped the bleeding just a little bit. we're seeing green on the screen, pretty much stablized for now. up about 1/2% after losing 5% yesterday. the dax index up .4%. meantime, in asia, reacting to what happened on wall street yesterday, down across the board. off nearly 6% today. the hang seng down 1 1/3%. the nikkei, by the way, in tokyo closed today. they probably had the best day of all. meanwhile, commodities, get a sense of that. we saw oil dropping yesterday, coming up a little bit today. up .6%.

to $81 a barrel. gold, meantime, down again slightly at $1737 per troy ounce. let's take a look now at how it closed yesterday with nicole on the floor. >> selling continues on wall street. dow, nasdaq and s&p dropping in a big way. dow jones industrial average was down 527 points at its lowest and at the end of the day, down 391 points. doesn't make you feel any better. on the contrary, you see selling after selling. four months of selling. dow jones industrial average for the month of september down 7% so the pressure has been on this market across the board, it's not one group. we saw a lot of the financials come under pressure and hit 52 week lows, names like goldman-sachs, morgan stanley and ubs all at 52-week lows. i got to tell you, the selling is broad based, everything from energy to retailers to drugs and such.

so with that, we saw all 30 dow components in the red, a name like united technologies was the worst performer of the group making a $16 1/2 billion acquisition of a company, it was the worst performance. keep a close eye on nike in friday's trading, after reporting its quarterly numbers. a lot of traders on wall street not feeling too confident. we broke through some key support levels. will they buy on friday? will folks take positions ahead of a long weekend? we will see. but certainly, this is the market we're seeing on thursday's trading. you know what was higher? a certain flight to quality, moving over to those treasuries, 10-year treasuries hitting record lows. 1.69%. ouch! right? you'd rather have microsoft or something that has a dividend yield of 3%. this is what we're seeing here on wall street as we wait to see when the bulls return. when do the buyings return? for right now on wall street,

the selling has continued through thursday's trading. friday, well, another ballgame. on the floor of the new york stock exchange. i'm nicole petallides. >> let's check back in with diane at our fox business headquarters. >> executives from solyndra will appear at a hearing on capitol hill today. both the ceo and cfo of the now bankrupt solar company has said they'll plead the fifth during questioning. republicans are frustrated by the move. they want to know more about how the company went under despite receiving a government loan of more than $500 million. mcdonald's is upping its cash dividends again. this time by 15% so $0.70 a share. the previous payout was $0.61 a share. the company says between that and the increased dividend and share buybacks, it will return about $6 billion to shareholders this year. the dividend will be payable on september 15th to holders of record as of december 1st. back to you.

>> thank you very much. as we've been saying, the dow has lost more than 6% over the two days. can we expect any rebound today or will the slide continue? joining us from our newsroom is ray hennesey, director of business news for the fox business network. good morning to you. i want to get first to europe and, well, you know, the global economy as a whole. it appears unlike in 2008 when we had the financial crisis, all about debt and what are the politicians going to do about it? we know we're in trouble when we're relying on politicians. is that the problem here? there seems to be no solution. >> no, there's two problems here. one is you're right there seems to be no solution and we're asking the people who got us into the problem to get us out of it. if you think of the political structure in a lot of countries including here that put us in the situation where we have a sovereign debt crisis arnold the world and that's kind of hitting banks and things like that. so that's one thing is you're asking the people who screwed everything up to fix it. and, you know, we've seen how well that goes. the other thing, frankly,

ashley, and i don't see this flippingly is people don't shut up. and, you know, if you saw yesterday, part of what fueled this selling were the people like the guard and folks like that, really just saying the obvious again, oh, the world is in danger of falling into another recession, we're almost in a recession. this is going to be bad. this is going to be bad if it hurts the developing world and it's going to hurt the developed world as well and what you saw with a lot of headlines and this is a very, very sensitive marketplace right now. i mean, this is a market that is very sensitive to every headline that crosses the tape, they're sensitive to everything that's coming out of a lot of these leaders. and what you don't see is you don't see sort of measured words coming out of people. you see a lot of people speaking almost in panicky terms so, you know, what you need is sort of political discipline on two levels. one, to kind of fix the fiscal problems in these countries. but also, two, to know when to

say something and when just to keep your mouth shut. >> and ray, let's talk about greece. i mean, this threat of default, it seems as though, as i said today, we're grinding towards this greek default no matter what the politicians say. obviously better to do that in a controlled matter than not. it appears nobody wants to bite the bullet. >> you know what? they should do it now. again, so we have the troika coming next month and i'll probably send you out to greece to cover that and then that will get us through to november or december and we'll have more people coming out and they'll need more money. it's a spectator's sport to evade taxes in greece. they're not collecting any money. they've proven that they really can't get their act together as quickly as some people thought. let them default, right? we know it's happening. take the medicine now. figure out a way to give them a haircut and do an organized default now. don't try to keep them along and if you know something like this that's coming, right, you can handle it.

and the market will anticipate that and the market will know how to price that in and you know what? greece will be fine. let them default. let them get through this. will everybody have to take a haircut? yeah, but does anybody not expect to take a haircut here? is anybody holding out hope they're going to get their money back out of greece? no, not at all. nobody is. deal with reality. people want to try to save face here but, you know it's not going to happen so you can do it in an organized way. do it right now. forget about extending this out. >> ray hennesey to imf director christine lagard, just shut up. appreciate it. a check of the markets as wall street braces for what could be its worst week in years. and we are one week away from a potential government shutdown. can congress figure it out before it's too late? let me tell you about a very important phone call i made.

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>> that was yesterday's closing bell on wall street bringing an end to another up day. worries over a global economic slowdown and europe's ongoing debt crisis led to a major selloff. the dow has fallen 674 points in just the last two sessions, the biggest two they dropped in nearly three years. just a few hours ago, the republican controlled house passed a temporary spending bill to keep the government running and it now goes to the senate where it will likely fail. raising concerns of a possible government shutdown one week from today. meanwhile, facing tough opposition on capitol hill, the president took his $447 billion jobs plan on the road demanding action on the home turf of two of his biggest g.o.p. rivals and the sparks were flying last night in florida as though vying to replace the president went at it again in the latest

republican debate. a very busy morning. i'm ashley webster. this is a fox business network special report. thank you for joining us. let's take a look at what happened on wall street yesterday and my, oh, my, we saw a huge selloff across the board. the dow finally finishing down 391 points. at one point down more than 500 points, nasdaq off 3 1/4% and the s&p down more than 3%. what can we expect today? well, at this hour, pointing upward, the dow up 49 points. the s&p up about 1/2% and the nasdaq, too, trading up by 1/2%. meanwhile, in europe, we are also seeing some green arrows although starting to lose a little bit of steam. we had a small bounce at the beginning of the session and then we dropped and now we've been somewhere in between stablizing if you like the ftse up barely by a 10th of a percent. in asia, really picking up on

what happened on wall street yesterday in south korea, the composite down nearly 6%. meanwhile, in china and hong kong, the hang seng down 1 1/3% but the shanghai down slightly on the day by 1/2%. nikkei in tokyo closed today for a public holiday. as for commodities, big selloff yesterday. oil pointing slightly high, up about $0.30 at $80 a barrel. gold down again. well, in just the past two days, the dow has fallen a whopping 675 points. it's the biggest margin since the height of the financial fallout in 2008. joining us now is fox business' lauren seminetta. how do we get to this point and where are we going? good question. >> excellent question that are every investor's minds right now. yesterday morning, we found out that china's growth was slowing, second largest nation in the world in terms of their economy and for the 17 countries in the

euro zone, that's sparking fears of a second global recession. whether we're in a recession or not technical is a debatable question but it feels like we're in a recession. stocks have been down for the past four months. people are concerned about the jobs market. their savings aren't earning interest and the fed's $400 billion operation twist announced this week seen as not stimulating the economy, if long term rates move lower, will that make a difference? people aren't buying homes, not because mortgage rates are high but because they're not confident. 2.3 million homeowners last year would have refinanced if they don't owe more on their homes than their homes are worth so the question is how do we get out of this slump? the holidays are fast approaching. will shoppers unleash pent-up demand and spend their money? and believe it or not, right now, the u.s. is being seen as the one safe place to go. people yesterday selling their gold and turning a profit and

hoarding the cash. the gold old american dollar rallied. commodities were lower, they were down and the yield on the treasury hitting new lows because people also went to the safety of the u.s. government bonds. ashley, back to you. >> cold, hard cash. put it under the mattress. all right. fox business' lauren semenetti, thank you very much. commodities took a beating as the markets plunged yesterday. sandra smith gives us the details from the chicago mercantile exchange. >> this year's gains for commodities now gone. the fed's bleak economic outlook weighing on commodities across the board in thursday's session. in fact, copper seeing its biggest selloff in years. that, of course, an industrial metal heavily tied to construction. and if there is slowing global demand, there certainly could be lower copper prices. oil also seeing big selling in thursday's session falling 6 bucks. it did fall at one point below

$80 a barrel but closed just above there with many traders saying if the economic concerns continue, we could see new levels in the 70's for oil. wheat and other food commodities falling. wheat fell to its lowest level in months. more concerns about slowing global demand, not just for the industrial metals, not just for gasoline but also for the food commodities and then finally, one everybody is watching, gold plunging in thursday's session. and erasing the last month of gains for the yellow metal. where was it flowing? the u.s. dollar, the safe haven that some see the u.s. dollar as was getting a lot of attention after the fed's move. it's not just about the fed traders here in chicago, it's about the ongoing crisis over in europe, slowing demand from china. all of this and the political uneasiness here in the united states, all of this weighing on markets across the board. the only thing in the green was

the green back itself. likely to be another wild ride in chicago on friday. we'll see you the rest of the day on the fox business network. back to you. >> that was fox business' very own sandra smith. thank you very much. for more analysis on the european markets i'm joined by david kuo, he is live in london. looks luke a beautiful day in the capital city. david, i want to pick on something that ray hennesey, the director of news was saying, he wishes the politicians and the policymakers just shut up rather than saying how bad the situation is needs to be fixed, if you're going to pay anything, come up with a solution or don't say anything at all. would you agree? >> i agree with him whole heartedly and i think one of the problems with the market is we can handle good news. in fact, we love good news. we can even tolerate bad news. but what we can't tolerate is uncertainty and what we're getting at the moment, ashley, is a lot of uncertainty. everybody putting in their two pennies worth and saying you should do this. you should do that. and of course, we got the g-20 which kind of voids the market

this morning, they're going to take some concerted action to alleviate the situation that's going on in europe but then people started scratching their heads and they're saying, well, what kind of concerted action are going to be taking? it doesn't seem you'll be doing an awful lot. you sit together, the 20 of you and say you're going to be doing something. talk is cheap and ultimately, what they want to see is action rather than just talking, ashley. >> that's a good point. i want to bring up angela merkel, the german chancellor. so much revolves around germany and what they're going to do. can they convince angela merkel that they're at the edge of the cliff and that something needs to be done? >> that's the crux of the matter, ashley. what the g-20 said is they need to beef up this thing called the european financial stability facility. in other words, this is what contains around about 400 billion euros which is going to be used maybe for financing the banks and also financing these

sovereign countries having debt probl problems. what they're saying is you need to pump more into the european financial stability. they mean that germany has to put its hands into its pockets and put more money into the funds. the other countries don't have that kind of cash available. really, it boils down to whether or not angela merkel can convince the german people they need to make this european experiment work in some way. and if she can't convince the german people, then, of course, it is doomed to fail and we have to remember also that the g-20 countries have other problems themselves. and it is almost like the fox that is stalking the chicken, it has to be aware of the hunter behind and the foxes at the moment are saying right, here's the chicken in front of me. these are the things i need to do in order to capture the chicken but unfortunately, in their home countries they have problems, ashley. >> very quickly, do you think the best solution really is to have some sort of controlled default by greece so at least we can take that off the table because it's already happening?

>> well, i think, yes, and one short answer is yes because that then would create certainty which is what the market wants and it hates this uncertainty. it would be bad news for greece but at least we would know where we stand at the moment. >> all right. david quo, thank you, david, so much for joining us. we appreciate it and i'm sure 'll be checking back in with you in the days and weeks ahead. check of the markets is straight ahead and we'll take a look back at last night's g.o.p. debate as the top two contenders once again went toe to toe.

>> welcome back, everybody. here are the ugly details from yesterday. dow finishes off 391 points. could be worse. it was down more than 500 points at one point. nasdaq finishing off 81 points and the s&p down more than 3% as

well. what can we expect at this hour? pointing upward. dow up 50 points in futures. 1/2% and the s&p up 6 points and the nasdaq up this hour up about 1/2%. meanwhile, what's been going on around the world? in europe, it's been somewhat of a ho-hum session that we will take after the huge drop yesterday. today, stablizing just essentially flat. up 1/4%. the dax essentially flat. just up about a 10th of a percent. in asia, plenty of selling seen there as well. certainly in seoul, south korea, down nearly 6% on the day. not as bad as that in china. in hong kong, the hang seng down 1 1/3% and the shanghai up and the nikkei closed for a public holiday. as for commodities, so our big selloff in commodities yesterday, right now, crude oil up a little bit. almost $81 a barrel. gold continuing lower, down $5

at $1736. let's go to diane now with the latest on the fox business network headlines. good morning to you, diane. >> hey, ashley. well, it says members of the g-20 right now vow to work together to bolster the struggling global economy so you pointed out that markets are largely in the green and that's where they're getting that boost from. in a statement, the group says it's committed to a strong and coordinated international response to address the renewed challenges that's facing the global economy and it says the main issues at hand are sovereign stresses, weak economic growth and high unemployment. moving on right now, the house has approved legislation to keep the government from shutting down. and the bill includes $3.7 billion in disaster aid. republicans were able to get it through on a narrow vote of 219-203. even before it passed the house, senate majority leader harry reid said the bill would be rejected in the senate. without a deal, keep in mind the shut down of the government is just a week away, hewlett-packard has named meg

whitman as the new chief executive. she's replacing the man who was appointed nearly a year ago. whitman was the ceo of ebay and h.p. shares fell in after hours trading. back to you. >> all right, diane, thank you very much. g.o.p. presidential hopefuls went at it last night in a debate sponsored by fox news and google. as expected, frontrunner rick perry was the main target. his rivals, especially former massachusetts governor mitt romney tried poking holes in perry's record on social security and immigration. perry took on romney's health care reform calling it an absolute bust. the debate comes ahead of the republican party of florida's straw poll tomorrow. in an effort to push his jobs plan to the top two republicans, president obama positioned himself at a bridge right in the middle of ohio and kentucky. the home states of speaker of the house john boehner and senate republican leader mitch mcconnell, obama urging the

republicans to pass the bill to rebuild this bridge and rebuild america. the president faces an uphill battle in getting the $447 billion plan passed in congress. delegations from the united states and other western countries walked out of the u.n. general assembly during iranian president mahmoud ahmadinejad's speech yesterday. in his address, ahmadinejad said that the 9/11 attacks were a pretext for the wars on iraq and afghanistan and blamed the u.s. for several global problems including the financial crisis. we're going to check the overseas markets and take a look at the u.s. futures when we come back. and also, lou dobson of the fox business network sits down with a leading member of congress. we'll be right back. never look a howler monkey in the eye.

fried ants are delicious. really. my students actually ended up teaching me. (foreign language) you think managing a sales team is tough... try working with five different villages. after two months i was ready to quit, but after two years, i didn't want to leave. i didn't know i had it in me. turn two years of service into a lifetime of experience. to all the peace corps volunteers past, present, and future, thank you for your service to your country and the world.

>> what can we expect on wall street today? the futures pointing higher. the s&p up 1/3% and the nasdaq up 1/4%. what's going on around the world? in europe, starting to turn negative again. paris down. dax index down about 1/2%. meanwhile, in asia, big selloff there. we've seen south korea down nearly 6%. meanwhile, in china, not so bad. the hang seng down about 1 1/3% so can we keep it positive today on wall street? we shall see. for some of the other business headlines making news, let's check in with diane at our fox business headquarters. >> executives from solyndra will appear on capitol hill today. both ceo and cfo of the now bankrupt solar company have said they'll plead the fifth. attorneys for the execs say they have little choice as the government launched a criminal investigation into solyndra's

collapse. still, republicans are frustrated by the move. they want details on how the company got a government loan of nearly $500 million and how it went under months after receiving that loan. nike posted first quarter results and they topped wall street expectations sending shares up in after hours trading. the company saw a 15% rise in profit as demand increased for its sneakers and athletic apparel in almost every market. revenue from north america rose 16% and surged 35% in emerging markets. nike's future orders rose. and mcdonald's is upping its cash dividend again, this time by 15% to $0.70 a share. imus in the morning continues right now on fox business. >> all right, diane. thank you very much. the house passed a temporary spending bill late last night and it now heads to the senate where it will have a tough time passing which could lead to a government shutdown just one week from today. last night, lou dobbs of the fox

business network spoke with congressman joe walsh about government spending. here's some of that interview. >> i didn't attend the president's joint session a couple of weeks ago on his jobs plan. i went home. >> i remember that. i bet he does, too. >> he does, too. and we sent him a letter. i talked to 110 small businessmen and women and i asked them, why aren't you hiring? what do you want out of your government when it comes to a jobs policy? one of the recommendations was government's got to stop spending all this money. they've got to get their books in order. because these guys know event l eventually it's going to hit them. >> books in order. dividing you all, as best as i can discern is an offset against 3 1/2 or $7 billion whether it comes to fema funding and the sweeten sweetener, apparently at this point put forward by republican leadership is $100 million reduction in funding for the green plan that funded solyndra?

i mean, surely there can't be this kind of drama around such a pittance, comparative pittance when we're talking about a trillion dollars. >> well, i don't think, lou, there is a lot of drama and, again, that's $100 million when it comes to solyndra we shouldn't be spending and, you know, it depends on who you talk to, lou. when it comes to this disaster relief, i wish we'd treat that separately. it's this washington habit of we put everything together. i mean, look, the house republicans voted on a budget, an fy12 budget this past year and i'd love to get back to that number. senate hasn't even passed a budget. it's important that we try to, forget the disaster relief, we should take care of that. >> that number would be what, a trillion 19, right? >> yeah. >> versus a trillion 43. that's $23 billion. >> at some point, you know, there's an old expression that i was taught, just don't let get

it reduced to principle. and the fact of the matter is, there are such important issues here. i was saying earlier to morton zuckerman when we were talking, we were talking about tax reform as a way forward to create jobs. if i'm one of the 25 million people in this country that doesn't have a job and i hear anybody say the solution is something that's going to take two to three years to get done, i'm going to be gut sick and i think we got a higher responsibility to the country than that. all of us as citizens, let alone you folks elected to office. >> well, we do, lou. understand, we're in a bind. the house republicans are in a bit of a bind here because we were sent to washington to really try to undo everything this president's done which we believe has destroyed this economy. it's caused a bumpy road but i think each and every one of these fights that we have and the super committee and the debt ceiling will come up again and then there will be appropriations fights, i take a

c c contrarian view. they want us to come together on something but they want us to be fiscally disciplined. >> i couldn't agree with you more and no one is more of a free enterprise capitalist than i am, no one believes more than a constitutional republic than i do. at the same time, i know this continuing resolution will take us through to a very short period of time. we're going to renew this debate, we've just had it a month previous, we also need to at some point move government policy to the point that we can restore prosperity in this country and that seems to me irrespective, that seems to me to be an urgent critical -- that is the urgent critical need of government right now. >> absolutely, lou. and you and i agree on the solution. get government out of the way. right now, the rest of this economy is overregulated and overtaxed. they're sitting on their hands right now because they're so scared at what this administration has been doing. again, we're trying to undo a lot of that and it just makes

for a bumpy road often. >> well, that does it for this fox business network's special report. stay with us throughout the day as we follow the markets and all the latest financial developments. coming up next, "imus in the morning" the iman's guest will include ashley mcgowan. have a great day. ???ñpux1

>> tgif, everyone. september 23, 2011. i'm gretchen carlson. thanks so much for sharing your time today. another g.o.p. debate and this time, the top