Just how insulated, if at all, is Europe from the financial crisis now engulfing the United States? At the weekend, the governments of Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands effectively nationalised the Belgian-Dutch financial services group, Fortis, the largest European company yet to be dragged down by the financial crisis. The governments' calculation is that their eleven-billion-dollar lifeline will restore rapidly sliding confidence and reassure investors - but on Monday, European bank shares continued to fall amid fears that other banks could face similar problems.

Tonight's guests are:

Catherine LUBOCHINSKY, Professor of Economics at Paris II-Panthéon-Assas University and a member of the Cercle des Economistes, an influential think-tank based in France.

Craig COPETAS, Senior Writer at Bloomberg News, and joining us by satellite from Frankfurt.

Bernhard JÜNEMANN, Deputy Editor in Chief of the German weekly magazine Börse Online (Stock Market Online).