FT-SE’s Rocky Ride

Following yesterday’s dramatic fall for the worse in the world’s stock market, traders around the world were bracing themselves for even worse this morning. As expected the crash went global and at one stage this morning more than £76 billion was knocked of British equities. London’s FT-SE index fell steeply first thing this morning hitting a low of -453.7 (4387.0) at 9:00am today, the biggest fall on record. This resulted from yesterday’s slump in New York. The market’s value suffered a tumultuous ride throughout the afternoon swinging to a second low of -422.5 (4418.2) at 2:32pm. During the afternoon the slump relented as the FT-SE index levelled somewhat. Mid-afternoon, however, a sudden fall pushed value down sharply. The FT-SE 100 clawed its way back up again and closed this afternoon at -85.3 (4755.4). This represents a drop in value of 1.76 per cent.

In Hong Kong earlier today the Hang Seng index suffered its biggest one-day fall, 13.7 per cent. Hong Kong stocks were hit first: Cable & Wireless shares dropped 38p to 435p. Japanese financial institutions are also in serous trouble following the world crash as they hold vast amounts of equities which have now collapsed in value. The Japanese Nikkei index plunged 725 points (4 per cent) to 15,312 today.