By Chris Oliver
HONG KONG (MarketWatch) -- Stock markets throughout Asia traded solidy lower Wednesday, apart from Shanghai where shares rose, as investors nervously eyed the euro's plunge to a fresh multi-year low against the U.S. dollar in overnight trade and assessed moves by German financial regulators to ban some types of short selling of euro-zone securities. SJS Markets' analysts said the sell-off was a early take on what may be seen as higher government intervention in the market following moves by German authorities to ban naked short selling of government bonds and credit default swaps linked to those bonds, as well as certain other assets. Of the leading regional indexes, Japan's Nikkei Stock Average was down 1.3%, South Korea's Kospi fell 1.5%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng gave up 1.1% and Australia's S&P/ASX 200 fell 1.6%. The euro bought $1.2195, rebounding 0.1% from its overnight close in New York, where the currency touched a fresh four-year low of $1.2159 before paring the loss. Among notable movers, Sydney-listed shares of Rio Tinto Ltd. (AU:RIO 63.45, -0.41, -0.64%) (RTP 44.73, -0.90, -1.97%) were down 1.1%, while Hong Kong-listed shares of Standard Chartered PLC (HK:2888 187.00, -5.50, -2.86%) (UK:STAN 1,685, 0.00, 0.00%) fell 2.9%. In Tokyo, Toyota Motor Corp.'s shares (JP:7203 3,530, 0.00, 0.00%) retreated 1.1%.
