London Telegraph
Sept 24, 2011
Global markets whipsawed higher and lower at the end of a tumultuous week as panic over a Greek default was tempered by hopes that politicians will step in to calm Europe’s debt crisis.
The FTSE 100 closed up 25.20 to 5,066.81 on Friday, but ended the week down 5.62pc, with £78bn knocked off the value of Britain’s blue-chip companies. While the index closed higher, it had fallen as much as 1.6pc earlier in the day, dropping through the pyschologically important 5,000 mark.
The falls came as traders were left underwhelmed by a communique rushed out in the early hours of Friday morning by G20 finance ministers at the IMF meeting in Washington. In the wake of Thursday’s global stock market rout, the G20 committed “to take all necessary actions to preserve the stability of banking systems and financial markets” but was criticised for failing to introduce concrete measures.
Speaking at the IMF meeting on Friday, UK Chancellor George Osborne ratcheted up the pressure on European leaders to solve the crisis by calling on them to bolster the European bail-out fund and declaring they have just six weeks to find solutions.
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