Shares surge as billions pumped into banks

LONDON (AFP) - Global stock markets staged spectacular gains Monday as governments pumped billions of dollars into banks crippled by the credit crunch, coaxing newly confident investors into buying shares.

Wall Street skyrocketed at the opening, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average 6.19 percent in positive territory at 8,974.56 by mid-day. The tech-heavy Nasdaq had surged 6.09 percent to 1,749.93.

Most European markets closed with double-digit increases. Hong Kong surged 10 percent in earlier Asian trade.

The London FTSE 100 index of leading shares jumped 8.26 percent to close at 4,256.90 while in Paris the CAC 40 rose 11.18 percent â€" its largest ever one-day gain â€" to 3,531.50. The Frankfurt Dax soared 11.40 percent to 5,062.45.

There were gains of 11.39 percent on the Swiss Market Index, 11.49 percent in Milan and 10.65 percent in Madrid.

Bucking the trend was Moscow, where Russia’s two stock exchanges closed down more than four percent.

The sharp falls came despite a Kremlin announcement that President Dmitry Medvedev had signed off on a rescue plan that is to provide an estimated 150 billion dollars to prop up Russia’s troubled financial markets.

Stock markets in the Middle East meanwhile made a strong comeback led by bourses in the oil-rich Gulf. The Saudi market, the largest in the Arab world, closed up 9.5 percent well above the 6,000-point mark after plunging to a four-year low of 5,794.87 at the start of the trading week on Saturday.

“We have had our first significant bounce in the markets for sometime now,� City Index market strategist Joshua Raymond said in London.