US futures make ground

WALL STREET OUTLOOK - firmer ahead of long weekend; Bush, Bernanke to speak

London shares - midday features

OUTLOOK Kazakhmys H1 profit seen increasing on higher copper prices

UK small caps hold firm near session highs midday; World TV up on bid approach

Midday Market Roundup

Precious Metals Summary - London AM Fixings

Euroshares extend gains midday, US futures higher ahead of Bernanke speech

London shares - midafternoon featuresMetals - Copper above 7,500 usd level on improving investor sentiment

Metals - Gold up on improving sentiment, equities, ahead of Bernanke speech

Precious Metals Summary - London PM Fixings

OUTLOOK Standard Life H1 profit seen up 59 pct

TFN economic and business calendar to Friday September 14

End-of-day Market Roundup

UK small caps close higher at session peak; World TV up on bid approach news

Friday's market reports:

Telegraph
The Times
The Times (Need to know)
FT
The Guardian
This is Money

Barclays Capital, the banks investment banking unit, and Cairn Capital, the London-based manager of the fund, insisted that the loan was not a rescue or bailout. Our investors are paying a commercial rate for that loan, a Cairn spokesman said.

Barclays steps in with $1.6bn injection for struggling SIV-lite fund

The banks that underwrote the $45 billion acquisition of TXU Corp, the worlds biggest buyout, have offered to pay the $1 billion (495 million) break fee in a desperate attempt to convince the private equity backers to drop their bid.

It is understood that the banks asked Kohlberg Kravis Roberts and TPG to consider withdrawing their offer after the turmoil in the credit markets meant that the banks would have little or no chance of syndicating the record-breaking $37 billion loan to investors. The banks include Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Citigroup, Lehman Brothers and JPMorgan.

Banks financing TXU buyout offer $1bn to get off the hook

Bob Diamond, the chief executive of Barclays Capital, has made a thinly veiled plea for the Bank of England to intervene in the money markets. In an interview with The Sunday Telegraph, Diamond said short-term liquidity in the money markets remained the biggest problem for the global financial system and said it was down to central banks to restore stability, praising the US Federal Reserve and European Central Bank's moves to inject liquidity. The BoE is the only major central bank yet to introduce emergency measures.

Barclays urges BoE to bail out money markets
Barclays comes out fighting

BOB DIAMOND, Barclays investment-banking boss, has scotched fears that Britains third-largest bank faces a black hole in its accounts from exposure to the turmoil in credit markets.

In an interview with The Sunday Times, he said: There was an impression that we had hundreds of millions in unsecured exposure. So we said that the potential, conservative, loss could be 75m. We do not like having to say things like that, but there were enough questions to make it important for us to make that statement.

Theres no black hole at Barclays, insists Diamond

Fears are mounting that British credit card debts could soon spark a fresh crisis in the global financial system. Debt-laden consumers in Britain owe more than 1.3 trillion, including more than 50bn on plastic.

Billions of pounds in credit card debt run up with Barclaycard, Egg, MBNA and every major card provider have been sold off to the capital markets in recent years. Many of these securitised debts are held in collateralised debt obligations (CDOs), the controversial funds that were involved in the downfall of the sub-prime mortgage market in America.

Credit cards: The next crisis?