Don’t even think about stopping by Starbucks. European traders this morning hit their desks after a day of carnage in Asia: markets were thrashed, bond sales pulled and a Japanese life insurer went belly-up.

Devastation in a part of the world where, broadly speaking, there are still big pots of cash and banking systems are solvent speaks volumes for the power of fear. Exposure to subprime, the genesis of the crisis, is tiny – 5 per cent of global bank write-offs, on HSBC’s reckoning. But just as greed always wins over rational behaviour on the upside, so fear calls the shots on the way down. Hence the Japanese stock market plunged 10 per cent in morning trading and now trades at less than book value. The Indonesian stock market is closed indefinitely and questions swirl over the solvency of the archipelago’s richest family. Safe havens? Forget it. Japanese government bonds plunged almost 2 full points on Friday morning.