Franky on Finance

Fear that America was about to tip into recession yesterday wiped £77bn off the value of FTSE shares, the biggest one day plunge in London since the terrorist attacks of September 2001.  Speculation that booming economic powerhouse China could be infected by the sub-prime crisis helped to trigger a global sell-off which resumed again this morning.  Shares rebounded after the US Federal Reserve slashed interest rates by 0.75%, their biggest rate cut in living memory, in an attempt to pull the world’s biggest economy away from a recession.  The pain on the British High Street was further evident today when the shoe-shops chain Dolcis founded in 1863, went into administration with accountants KPMG now running the business.