Sep 20, 2008 7:16 am US/Eastern
CBS4 Your Money: Week Of Historic Economic Change
U.S. Debt May Grow $1-Trillion On Federal Government Rescue Of Financial Community
MIAMI (CBS4) ―
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Traders work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange.
Spencer Platt/Getty Images
It was a week that ended with stock markets around the globe soaring as regulators took steps to shore up the financial system, the biggest makeover since the 1930s.
On Monday, when the opening bell kicked off the week's trading, Wall Street had no idea it would be making history: stocks tumbled as investors reacted to the fall of Wall Streets' twin financial giants Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch.
Then on Tuesday, the Federal Reserve Bank held it's line on interest rates at two percent, but the big news came afterwards when Uncle Sam hammered out a deal to loan the global giant insurance company, A.I.G. with a taxpayer's price tag of $85-billion.
But the financial community blood-letting wasn't over.
On Wednesday, another disastrous day on Wall Street, and stocks fell more than 500 points as investors around the world panicked.
On Thursday, there was enough of a loss of confidence in the U.S. financial system that President Bush addressed the nation to try and prevent an economic collapse.
President Bush said, "The American people can be sure we will continue to act to strengthen and stabilize our financial markets and improve investor confidence."
But it wasn't Bush's speech that calmed America's financial nerves but new reports of a government plan to stabilize the entire financial community: a federal government bailout.
At the end of the week, after high-level meetings, the president insisted new plans were coming together with key congressional leaders to create a new agency with the U.S. having to borrow an extra $700 billion to $1 trillion to fund the biggest rescue of the financial system since the Great Depression.
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