Asian stock markets plunged Friday in the wake of a sell-off on Wall Street amid mounting concerns about a slump the U.S. economy and its impact on the global economy. European shares also opened lower.

The top business news from The Associated Press for the morning of Friday, Sept. 5, 2008:

Treasury prices rose moderately Thursday, as a plummeting stock market sent investors back into safer, fixed-income government securities.

Dejected investors sent stocks plunging Thursday, hurtling the Dow Jones industrials down more than 340 points after retailers and the government added to a mountain of bad economic news and devastated hopes for a late-year recovery.