Plunging assets cost $50,000bn

Falls in the value of financial assets worldwide might have reached more than $50,000bn, equivalent to a year’s global economic output, the Asian Development Bank will warn on Monday. Asia has been hit disproportionately hard, the bank will say, in a report that warns of many Asian stimulus plans lagging behind those of the leading global economies. Separately, the World Bank said on Sunday that developing countries faced a financing gap of between $270bn and $700bn a year as capital flows dried up, with only a quarter of vulnerable countries able to cushion the blow of the economic downturn.