The FTSE 100 index tumbled 5.5% to 5,578.2, wiping £84bn ($163bn) off the value of its listed shares.

Indexes in Paris and Frankfurt slumped by about 7%, while markets in Asia, India and South America also dropped.

Investors questioned whether a plan to boost the US economy would do enough to avert a full-blown recession.

"It's another horrible day," said Francis Lun of Fulbright Securities in Hong Kong.



"Today it's because of disappointment that the US stimulus is too little, too late and investors feel it won't help the economy recover."

US markets are closed for a public holiday on Monday and will re-open on Tuesday.

'Panic mode'

The worry is that tax breaks and spending measures will do little to boost consumer spending in the US because of problems in the housing market.

Many shoppers are struggling under higher mortgage repayment costs, and default rates have surged.

At the same time, banks have had to become more careful about who they lend to because they have lost billions of pounds on investments linked to the US housing and mortgage markets.

Got to laugh at this. The UK and US for years have been selling off bits of their industries, offshoring productive industries, and borrowing excessive amounts of capital to buy goods from those offshored industries. If through this your forcing down average real (inflation adjusted) wages, you can only squeeze out so much increased spending from the consumer, without the rest being the result of debt. So of course its unsustainable, so why is the end of the party, it's occurrence, so shocking?

It might be possible to delay the day of reckoning, but not stop it.

It does seem an odd policy to throw away production and service jobs en mass, borrow money to keep your people unemployed at home, or employ them in Government Services, then use borrowed money to buy up goods from the people you gave your jobs to overseas, and then herald those Nations such as China and India as economic powerhouse miracles.


Is someone taking us all for a ride ? I think so!!!!!!.

All boarding the brownite train, we have just left economic miracle. The next stop and our final destination will be, economic destitution.

Poor old Gordon. Is he jinxed? 50 billion wasted on Northern Crock, house prices falling, stock markets lose more than 5% in a single day, severe flooding, mountains of wood piled high on beaches, a jet crashes almost at his feet -
All we need now is swarms of locusts and thunderbolts from the heavens and Richard Branson to come up with his new Virgin Ark concept.....

I am feasting on bear food at the moment.

You can hear Tony Blair, laughing his ar5e off.

This site is so amazing. In one thread we discuss 84 billion wiped off the stockmarket, in another we angst over a burger king closing down!

Reminds me of that saying - what goes around comes around!

or even

Be careful what you wish for!! Maybe he would have acted differently as chancelllor if he had known that all HIS chickens would come home to roost when it was his turn as PM.


TB's timing was impeccable!!

The Bad:
FTSE 100 down 13% since start of 2008, £77-84 Bn lost so far. Back to June 2006 in growth, inflation could make a 3 year loss.

The Good:
Northern Rock closed up 46% at 84 pence, after falling from £11.65 to 52 pence a share since September 2007.

I've often wondered about that, at least since reading the following in The Spectator of 26 march 2005:

"As for Gordon Brown, the wonder is not whether he will be the next prime minister, but that he should want to be."

still, at least we all have a nice pension to look forward to!

And what is our imposter leader doing on his trip - talking about a NWO - funny thing that - its beginning to look like a planned collapse.......

I mean - you really couldn't make it up could you?

And to think that nobody even seen this coming - of course they did..

How do you make that out - Gordon doesnt have a care in the world, he doesnt care what Brits think (hes above that and will get his financial rewards from his master when he leaves office like the other waster did)

The tories must be loving the fact that Gordon bottled out in calling an election at the end of last year. Imagine white
washing the Labour party only to have all this sh** fall into your lap within a couple of months.

Don't like to mock the afflicted but a serious question here. Why has Gordon Brown got no neck? No, serious. He looks
like his heads been dumped straight on his shoulders and it kind of bugs me every time I see him rambling on about no
more boom and bust.

Yes, most probably he's laughing at us the smarmy ****.

What really really really bothers me, is the fact that they keep calling him the best chancellor we have ever had and the sheep believe it!

And whats that silly thing that he keeps doing with his mouth when he takes in air?

Exactly!!

You can see it and I can see it but it appears that this crushingly simple piece of logic has totally escaped our political. financial and corporate leaders.

Maybe it's a shawshank redemption moment...only twas TB that left through GB modeling poster pose!

How will history reflect on goooorrrdan Brrruunneee now?

Isn't that a typical rugby-playing bullneck type of physionomy? Remember that's how he lost his eye. But that still doesn't excuse his curious gulping or The Claw on the text of his speech!

What's going on? It says this topic has been moved. Moved to where? Where the fu** are we? I've looked all over the forum but to no
avail.