Last night Alastair Darling, the UK Chancellor, guaranteed 100% of savings in Northern Rock – and indeed the Financial Services Authority has since gone further, stating this guarantee extends to other troubled financial institutions that might emerge in coming days. Given the scenes we’ve witnessed since Thursday’s news that Northern Rock required a lifeline from [...]
Commentary
As I write, people are queuing outside a major British lender, Northern Rock, to take all their money out. Only in Britain would a run on a bank see customers forming an orderly line from the back. Reading comments in the press, it’s clearly something that many people never expected to see in their lifetimes. [...]