Reuters - Wall Street titans buckled under the weight of a global stock market panic on Friday as the finance chiefs of the world's major economies gathered in Washington to confront the inescapable financial crisis.

Reuters - Stocks tumbled in a turbulent session on Friday, as panicked investors dumped stocks in a global sell-off on mounting fears that frozen credit markets would push the world into recession.

AP - Dismal September sales results from mall-based apparel chains, released Thursday, offered more fresh evidence that American consumers, spooked by the financial meltdown, shut their wallets tight last month.

Reuters - American International Group Inc has so far borrowed $70.3 billion under a U.S. government bailout loan even as regulators keep a close eye on how the insurer is using those funds, The Wall Street Journal said.

Reuters - Citigroup abandoned its brief but acrimonious battle with Wells Fargo & Co over Wachovia Corp , one of the United States' largest banks, losing out on a deal crucial to strengthening its retail banking business but vowing to pursue up to $60 billion in legal claims.

Reuters - Europe joined Asia's panic selling in stocks on Friday, knocking the benchmark world equity index to a 5-year trough, while the low-yielding yen jumped as fears grew that efforts by policymakers are insufficient to contain the global financial crisis.

Reuters - The U.S. government is weighing guaranteeing billions of dollars in bank debt and temporarily insuring al U.S. bank deposits, in a bid to unfreeze bank lending and staunch massive losses in equity markets, The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.

Reuters - The world's economic powers faced huge pressure on Friday to devise drastic remedies to revive the banking system and end panic selling in global financial markets.

AP - American consumers went into hiding in September, leaving retailers with dismal sales and an uncertain future well beyond the holiday season as the fallout from the financial meltdown pushes spending even lower.

Reuters - UBS AG is halting its widely read weekly mortgage strategy report after more than 15 years of publication as the bank broadly scales down in the home loan business, including the closure of its asset-backed securities group, sources said.

AFP - Democratic White House hopeful Barack Obama on Wednesday bemoaned the "irrational despair" afflicting tumbling stock markets, and said President George W. Bush was too weak to fix the crisis.

Reuters - Canada has the world's soundest banking system, closely followed by Sweden, Luxembourg and Australia, a survey by the World Economic Forum has found as financial crisis and bank failures shake world markets.