Global stock markets ended a miserable week at multi-year lows as fears of a deepening worldwide recession and fresh worries about the banking sector drove nervous investors to the perceived safety of gold, government bonds and the dollar.

The US S&P 500 index sank below the psychologically significant 800 level, European stocks fell to six-year lows and the Topix share index in Japan closed at its worst for a quarter of a century as gold broke above $1,000 an ounce and the dollar touched a three-month high against the euro.