The biggest round of US job cuts for 15 years helped push Wall Street stocks lower yesterday as fears heightened over the scale of the difficulties facing financial institutions.

Financials were among the biggest losers, down 6 per cent overall. Citigroup shed 6.6 per cent to $8.89 after unveiling plans to cut 52,000 jobs, which, according to consultants Challenger Gray & Christmas, was the biggest job cut announcement since the 60,000 by IBM in 1993.