hang seng

China's stock market has rebounded slightly on Tuesday after its worst day for 18 months, as the country's parliament begins its annual session.

Banking stocks continued to pull back the FTSE 100 on Monday, as the losses announced by Lloyds Banking Group last week continued to dog the group and its peers.

The FTSE 100 opened almost 10 points lower this morning, pushing it under 6,190 points, after disappointing trading sessions across the globe overnight.

The FTSE 100 has started to recover during this morning's trading, after its first poor finish since the start of the year on Monday.

Minutes from the latest Federal Reserve meeting suggesting its quantitative easing programme could end sooner than expected have hit equity markets overnight.

Asian stock markets rallied overnight as Hong Kong's Hang Seng Composite index posted its longest streak of gains in seven years.

Key Asian markets showed resilience from global growth fears as the main Hong Kong and Chinese stock markets rallied strongly overnight, though Japanese stocks bucked the trend.

Asian markets continued the global stock market rally, following yesterday's unveiling of the ECB's bond buying plans, with some indices up 3.8%.

Asian stock markets echoed Wall Street's overnight slump as investors fretted over declining Japanese export figures.

Equity markets around the world have struggled to make headway this year, with many major indices giving up gains made early on to leave them standing flat or down for 2012.