Papers

The role of America's federally regulated banks in the $50bn Bernard Madoff investment scandal has come into question after it emerged that a number of victims of his alleged Ponzi scheme thought they had invested their money with an ordinary bank, The...

Investment guru Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway has been hit with its worst annual performance in 30 years with a 32pc fall.

China's stock market became the worst major performing index in the world for 2008, ending the year down 65%, The Times reports.

Japan's stock market finished its worst year in history today after the world's second-largest economy was buffeted by the global financial crisis, a deepening recession and a soaring currency, The Telegraph reports.

Beleaguered bank RBS is poised to abandon the attempted £7bn sale of its insurance operations, which include the Direct Line and Churchill brand names, reports The Guardian .

The administrators to Lehman Brothers in the UK are close to selling a £900m portfolio of sub-prime mortgages, for a price of about 50p in the pound, The Telegraph reports.

Britain needs negative interest rates to claw its way out of recession but will instead cut them to 1pc and flood the market with cash through Japanese-style "quantitative easing", according to Legal & General Investment Management.

The head of Barclays bank predicted today that the economic gloom gripping the UK would deepen further, with house prices set to tumble as unemployment figures soar.

Labour's natural supporters are returning to the fold, giving the party a nine-point lead over the Conservatives as the most trusted to deal with the recession, a poll for The Times reveals.

Sir Sean Connery has given his backing to a legal bid to halt the merger of HBOS and Lloyds TSB, campaigners said, The Telegraph reports.