Closing stock market indices

Here is how major stock markets outside the United States ended on Thursday.
EUROPE STOCKS EXCHANGE: European blue-chips ended at two-week lows as worries erupted about profits in the technology sector and the damage to global economic growth if US interest rates are hiked too soon.
But strategists say the market was due a correction given gains of around seven percent since last December and that investors were taking profits as they digested a statement from the US Federal Reserve on the economy and interest rates.
"We expect some near-term consolidation...The Fed is slowly changing its rhetoric to prepare the market for a rate rise," said Klaus Wiener, chief strategist at AMB Generali Finanz.
But this is not the end of the rally. We expect Europe to show a full-year return of about 10 percent.
The FTSE Eurotop 300 index of pan-European shares gave up 0.87 percent to end at 987.25 points, the lowest close since 980.31 on January 15. Amid good volumes the ratio of losers to gainers was four to one.
FRANKFURT STOCKS EXCHANGE: The DAX index ended at 4,095.71 points, down 54.53 or 1.31 percent.
PARIS STOCKS EXCHANGE: The CAC-40 index closed at 3,662.3 points, down 44.49 or 1.20 percent.
ZURICH STOCKS EXCHANGE: The Swiss market index closed at 5,768.2 points, down 35.1 or 0.60 percent.
MILAN STOCKS EXCHANGE: The All Share Mibtel index closed at 20,726 points, down 175 or 0.84 percent.
SYDNEY STOCKS EXCHANGE: Stocks ended at a five-week low as investors, cued by a dour Wall Street, sold the market down after US monetary policy-setters hinted that an interest-rate rise could be on the horizon.
The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 shed 15.1 points, or 0.46 percent, to 3,264.5.
JOHANNESBURG STOCKS EXCHANGE: Stocks closed flat as losses in platinum and gold mining stocks cancelled gains in other heavyweight blue-chips such as Sasol and leading industrial firm Barloworld.
The All-share index closed flat at 10,854.39, down just 7.73 points or 0.07 percent.
The All Gold index closed at 2,464.19 points, down 77.93 or 3.07 percent, while the Industrial index closed at 7,202.24 points, up 27.28 or 0.38 percent.