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  from the independent.
  
  Tens of billions of pounds were wiped off the value of shares on both sides of the Atlantic amid renewed fears about the world economy and the solvency of big European banks.
  The FTSE 100 Index slumped 3.05 per cent to its lowest point in a year and falls elsewhere were even bigger. The Dow Jones Index in the US ended 4.62 per cent down, while France's Cac 40 plunged by 5.45 per cent and Germany's Dax by 5.13 per cent.
  Shares in London alone had £41bn wiped from their value, taking the total loss to investors and pension funds in the recent losing run to £226bn, and more than $3trn globally. The FTSE 100 ended the day almost 158 down leaving it at 5,007 points. The Dow fell almost 520 points.
  
  The losses eradicated all of Tuesday's gains and left the markets reeling as they veered towards what analysts regard as classic "bear" territory - a decline of about a fifth since they peaked earlier this year.
  Panic selling of shares in Italy's largest bank, Unicredit, even had to be suspended because of the scale of the sell-off. When dealing resumed the shares were 10 per cent lower than their opening price.
  
  And in France mistaken rumours that Société Générale, the country's second-biggest bank, was a distressed seller of gold caused it to lose 20 per cent of its value. The fall was stemmed only when the bank put out an official denial: "SocGen categorically denies all the market rumours." It ended up 14 per cent down on the start of the day.

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