I have been doing research and I think and hope im wrong but we cant rule out a massive collapse of the value of the doller and the chinese stockmarket both going together while we here in the UK have a little local difficulty that would be one mother of a bad day.

joe, london, uk

I concur with Mervin King that lenders who have been reckless should not be bailed out. I do not see why the Fed should be so concerned about bailing out irresponsible lenders. It's high time that such lenders be allowed to die out of the world's financial system. It's time for a good rid the markets of suicide-bombers, I mean speculators. There have been so much hue and cry from irresponsible lenders and borrowers about the need for a reduction in interest rates that I am finally inclined to believe that the Fed might cut the rate. Should the Fed decide to cut the rate this Tuesday Fed I will have no reason to disbelieve that even the Fed could be nose-led by irresponsible lenders. An argument has been adduced that the job of central bankers is also to prevent a collapse of our financial system and therefore liquidity has to be provided at low rates. I do not agree for in so doing central bankers are themselves possible re-occurence of such crises in future.

R. Basant Roi, Vacoas, Mauritius

So, Greenspan "really didn’t get" that lax lending standards would endanger the world economy. But he knew "the Iraq war is largely about oil.” Maybe Bush should have moved "the Undertaker" into the Sate Department.

Jenn, Los Angeles, CA, USA

Hyperinflation is coming for sure. Gold, food, and energy in some form is what we, the little people, can do to protect ourselves. The problem now is not lack of liquidity, but rather fear on the part of banks.

susan chisholm, southampton, UK

absolute greed has spawned this crisis, I always asked what are these people trying to do make sure people have not a dime in their pockets by over charging for everything. It was always the bottome line, charge an extra 20 cent on everything so we can cover the bottom line. I always wondered when people had no money to cover the bottom line what would eventually happen and I guess this is the end result. If companies, groups, organizations, lobbyist, and politicians had not been so eager to line their own pockets with gold (think JUDAS) a lot of what is happening to them wouldn't be. Don't ask for sympathy from the public, you have plundered and stolen f rom us and now the price will be paid not by the public, but the companies that sold their souls for money.

Ms Faye, vallejo, california

Central banks will inflate the world economy into oblivion. Little people will lose and the banking elite are the only winners. They pay lip service to fighting inflation to cover up their tracks. Gold and oil prices are surging. Hyperinflation is coming. People can only be fooled for so long!

Fedup, Vancouver, Canada

And the bankers paid £1m plus a year whose billiant idea it was to lend £300m of our money to people who could never repay it, and who dont even take a note of what they were lending and to whom? Why, they go on being paid £1mplus a year while we pay for their economic sabotage.

Capitalism doesn't work. Except for bankers.

julian, london,

So the BOE is going to cut interest rates.What a joke.The pound will fall,oil will shoot up and the battle against inflation will be lost.The market is already losing confidence in sterling.

Steve, Eure, France

The wide range of possibilities both for bank loss provisions against profits and for palliative interest rate cuts could offer scope for high market volatility as expectations are met or not, as the case may be.

The difficulty for those making such decisions would be compounded by the possibility of later amendment by any further actions necessitated by later information.

The complexity of such a multi factorial series of crises seems to be without precedent, and renders much prediction tenuous.

dr venables preller, Warminster, UK