World Economy

摘要

The credit crunch has intensified dramatically over the last two months. The collapse of Lehman Brothers was the first of a series of high-profile failures of major financial institutions. The bank failures have exacerbated distrust with banks hoarding liquidity. As a result interbank rates have surged upwards and interbank lending has virtually halted. Financial stress levels have skyrocketed and equity market volatility has increased significantly, with the world's leading stock markets declining by in excess of 25% since the beginning of September.