Plunging mkts trigger new intervention warnings in Asia

After some of the most dramatic declines in global financial markets since the Federal Reserve began lifting borrowing costs six months ago, authorities in Asia are stepping up efforts to prevent a downward spiral.

- SOFIA HORTA E COSTA & HOOYEON KIM 

South Korea joined a growing list of interventions on Wednesday, with the central bank saying it will buy as much as $2.1 billion worth of sovereign debt. In Taiwan, officials have floated currency controls and signaled a readiness to ban stock short sales. China has instructed some funds to refrain from large share sales and told banks to ensure the yuan's daily fixing is being "respected" by market players.

Governments all over the world are grappling with the fallout from the Fed's most aggressive trajectory of interest-rate hikes since the 1980s, with the rapid surge in the dollar yanking capital away from virtually everything else. Attempts to control markets in Asia -- a region haunted by memories of the 1997 financial crisis -- are so far yielding few convincing results.