futures over 200 points down. let's get that market open with caroline hyde. caroline: let's look in on what will be a volatile trading session, because we can't work out whether we are looking for risk or for the heathens. -- the havens. we are waiting for the market to open, and just opening on the dow, off by a quarter of a percent. downs some very ups and over in asia, no one really understanding which way to trade at the moment, as it seems that china does manage to unleash the amount of steadiness people wanted to see. they cut rates for the banks, cut rates in general, hoping people would are lend lend. it doesn't seem to resuscitate these markets. risk aversion is playing out on the equity markets so far this morning, after we saw more than

300 billion euros going to the stoxx 600 yesterday, before coming back down. let's have a look at what's happening in terms of some of our search for safety. this is the dollar rising versus the yen. this helps power through some of the japanese us stocks. that particular haven seems to be somewhat out. gold, too, coming out o. there doesn't seem to be a rush for that haven, even though we are seeing it selloff. i want to show you what's happening in commodities. copper is once again trading lower. check out the miners, a number lower this morning as china pays the price of not enough stimulus coming from the pboc. copper is off by 1.3%, oil trading a little bit higher, up 7/10 of a percent. let's have a look at what's happening in terms of bond market. yields rise for u.s. debt.

vogue.t haven in meanwhile, costs coming up for germany. update,a daily regular down by some seven basis points. buttoo much concern, remember, not many are buying a liquidity. let's have a look at what we can see. miners being dragged lower, oil companies coming back. a big, significant move for this country -- it canceled its dividend. down goes transocean. jonathan: thank you. european equities are chasing the u.s. close. the 5100 is down by 1.4%, the dax trading lower. the cac 40 lower by 1.8%. watchingven up on

whether shanghai composite is trading because it is now closed. david ingles is now in hong kong. david, where did the shanghai composite finish today? david: lower. 1%. i give up as well. the best way to report on this market is to let it be. let it be and look at the close. for all intents and purposes, it is really hard to make out what's happening. volumes are very, very thin. not a lot of people that now is the time to play the game. we have been signed back and forth-- sawing back and easily over 40 times. big swings. we are down 1.3%, down again for a fifth consecutive session. that takes losses to about 25%. as this chart shows you, it is really hard to make out what regulators want to happen.

yes, we had the rate cut, but there was a point from what i -- what thet market needs is tangible steps. things like lowering equity trading, things like that, things people can work with. until these traders get something more manageable, we are likely to see volatility process. we are below 3000. the more pronounced reaction -- you guys can take this away later on tonight -- is the movement of the chinese currency. that is what arguably started everything off. 4136, the weakest level in 30 years. surprising giving the dual cuts yesterday from the pboc. that is a pronounced reaction. and let me give you this very encouraging measure. this is the repo rate.

it is substantially down today. the rrr cuts, the interest rate cuts announced yesterday, alleviating some of the pressure in the money markets. jonathan: david ingles, thank you very much. a five-day route on the shanghai composite. down 23% in just five trading days. the biggest since december, 1986. despite a rate cut from china. i want to get the latest on the right action from pboc. kevin hamlin has been a busy man in beijing and he has the details. kevin, i was going to ask how unexpected was the cut -- i think many people expected the trooperrr. yeah, that's right. pressure has been building on china to do something amid the global anxiety.

the rrr cut was widely seen coming. most people were a little bit surprised that the pboc also cut rates. jonathan: for you, when you look at what they are dealing, has this got anything to do with the stock market? if it has, it's not really working, is it? it's not soothing investors at all. the second part would be whether it supports growth anytime soon. it gives relief to local governments that have about one trillion yuan this year. that helped. it helps -- the history of interest rates shows that loose investment in the short-term, the problem is that it pushes investment into sectors where there is already overcapacity. that leads to more capacity and pushes prices down, and ultimately you can get a reverse situation whereby real interest

rates rise as the result of an interest rate cut. this also won't help consumption, like in the west, where people have lower mortgage costs and lower credit costs. in china, people tend to think their deposit rates have gone down, they need to save more for the future. long-term, it just continues with the old growth model that hasn't worked so far for china. great insight, kevin hamlin, thank you very much. i want to stay with china -- i'm pleased to say that we are china from paris by the economist and says the recent cut to rrr for all banks was an absolute necessity, but it may not be enough. great to have you with us. yesterday made some waves in london. this rate cut, according to you, very little with the stock market and everything to do with currency. for those of us who haven't read

your research, can out, paint the picture of what your argument is? >> sure. nk,t the pboc did was, i thi was because of the situation -- it started from the regime change, and now given the regime change, the markets start to go before the pboc and tried to depreciate the currency more than they wanted. so the pboc tried to lean against the market, sell their fx reserves, the domestic liquidity. it becomes collateral damage of its policy, and as a result, cutting rrr is absolutely necessary, because pboc has to neutralize the impacts of this intervention. intervention,

cutting rrr -- this is just a path pboc is stuck in. jonathan: wei, to draw on what you said, the tightening over the last two or three weeks -- what they did yesterday won't be a stimulus on a net basis at all, will it? think so. don't i understand the market takes it as a big easing move, but i think we will see that the impacts may be quite limited, especially for the rrr cuts. the interbank rates today in china seem to be falling, and it seems that there is some relief there, but if the intervention continues, this will be gone very quickly. it is a temporary fix. one detail is very important -- at the same time as the interest rate cut, pboc liberalized the

deposit rates further. -- any deposit longer than one year is not subject to a cap. it is the disguise of easing, so it's much more limited than the market thinks. jonathan: wei, how active has the pboc been, and what is china selling? is it just dollar denominated assets? what's happened in the past few weeks is case in point, what we should expect. we should continue to expect china's rebalancing process, meaning that the government basically has two goals in mind. one is to rebalance the economy in the long run, the other is to prevent the economy falling off a cliff in the short-term. so letting currency go is a move that we should expect sooner or

later. it is a move that they should do anyway, but they picked this timing in the sense that, when they do it, it just leads to massive volatility. some people may argue that weaker currency will help the economy. i think the benefit may be much smaller than in the decades before. also, because of the volatility and the financial instability caused, it could actually do some harm. what we call this -- this is a lending that the government tried to liberalize the economy at the same time introducing more risk, can they have to do more easing to fix the problem. it's quite difficult. jonathan: wei, for anyone trying to guess or gauge what the pboc may or may not do in the months to come, is it just down to the pboc's approach with the exchange rate? and if they want to carry on stabilizing the currency, they will leak reserves and they have

to keep on cutting the rrr? this that what happens in the months to come? wei: i think that is definitely a scenario. quite possible. but at the same time, if the pressure on the currency continues to build, and at some point pboc has to decide to really let go even a bit more and to let the market decide where the fair value should be, i think right now the concern is probably that if they let go too there will be someone unforeseen negative consequence for the external debt. but at some point, they really have to decide, if they really let the currency go, they can finish the reform very quickly, and they don't have to spend a lot of excess reserve to see if their domestic policy is a better path to take. jonathan: wei, as far as you're concerned, with rates at 4.5%

and a triple are approaching 18%, factoring in where the economy is, where growth is, would you characterize the monetary policy staff as neutral or maybe even tight? and how low do you think rates need to go to have a loosening? say i think it's fair to it's still on the somewhat tighter side. especially given the outlook of more affects intervention. -- it'sky thing is somewhat hard to judge the pboc's stance now given that they have almost completely liberalized their interest rate. one better indication is to look o, toe domestic rep look at government bond yields. the seven-day repo rate has been trading at 2.5%. if the pboc does more liquidity injections and forces close to 2%, i would think there will be

more easing, and i think that is what the pboc should do. jonathan: a privileged to have you on the show, thank you very much. up, a 400 point rally in the dow jones crumbles into the close. the pboc cannot stop. we will talk about the central bank policy response. then, power play -- a wave of consolidation washes over the gambling industry. wpp gets a boost from madmen over in north america. the advertising giants, a: 40 u.k. time. opening up more in dublin -- we will bring you more on the story later. ♪

jonathan: good morning and welcome back, i'm jonathan ferro. let's bring you up to speed on bloomberg's top stories. an agreement in principle reforms for a merger. it would bring together one of the uk's leading high street bookies with the largest internet betting exchange. chinese stocks fell again today continuing a five-day falling straight. the shanghai composite closed by 1.5% down. it was an intense session for u.s. stocks yesterday, a 3% rally on the s&p, but it

extended the s&p losing streak for six straight days, the longest since 2012. the index has lost more than 11%. volatility is rich through global markets, and people find themselves a difficult situations. the pboc eases rates and the fed must consider its own form of easing, delaying a rate hike. >> we could see more aftershocks from what we have just seen over the past 10 days, and those aftershocks can shake confidence. they can get people into a panic mode, and at that point it would be emergency time. i'm not saying it will, but it could happen. the fed would have to take action and keep rates as low as possible. >> there was a window. it was a few weeks ago, when you have strong domestic economy, which he still do. you had printed international economy, and you had the financial market that you could

readily shape. that window has now closed. i don't think the fed will take the risk of hiking in this environment, because if it makes a mistake, it will end up making a mistake that could spell back onto the u.s. economy. jonathan: as the likelihood of a theember rate hike slides, volatility threatens to destabilize europeans. how will mario draghi respond? let's go to hans nichols in berlin. the ecb already seemingly finding it difficult to bite abs. i know abs as of the big part of the overall program but it speaks to the idea that they have to widen the pool of assets if they want to make the program bigger. hans: that is one way to put it. what we are reporting is the european central bank is going directly to investor holdings beyond just banks to try and buy abs.

the whole goal is to try and revive the ebs market. remember, it took a big fall in 2006. euros, and this year it is already at 55 billion, up from 47 billion in 2014. but when you take a look at the goal and what they want to do, it is about reviving this market, adding more liquidity. here is the market participant's sense to askkes the dealer to seek offers directly from investors." that is according to rob ford. on this is done out of our london bureau. great reporting. it gets to some of the challenges that the ecb is facing. when you take a look at what the abs program is compared to other programs, this is a small fraction, about 10% of the covered bonds.

so far there have been 11 billion and purchases, about 3% of the total bond buying program. while we have here is an attempt to revive this market, it it really does -- a lot of this started in june, so this was before the market volatility really took place. but it shows you some of the challenges they are facing. jonathan: hans nichols, thank you very much. i want to get an investors take now. he is a hero and founding partner of the house management. great to have you with us. hans nichols was talking about our london reporters. a story about the 15 major central banks that have hiked rates -- they had to reverse the decision. the ecb was one of the central banks. people look at that as a ridiculous move. now they think, what is the policy response if they have to do more? what can they do? >> they have to continue with quantitative easing, what they have got in their favor is the

euro that is undervalued quite significantly. they have reasonable equity valuations as well. europe is now being perceived as a reasonably safe haven when you look at what markets have done. jonathan: i was told go long for dax and we will stand it. dax down. how busy have you been in the last three trading days, the last week? yogesh: we have been extremely busy in the way we have been communicating with clients and holding their hands. but in terms of trading, we have been watching. the key thing here is not to panic. markets are down 6% year to date, we have volatility fixed at levels we last saw in the neiman brothers crashed in 2008. this is altering a period when it is extremely light, and panic is being driven and fueled by

what the media is causing. jonathan: if we could bring back that s&p 500 again. the chart that shows the s&p 500 going back to the end of 2013. we are 1% away from erasing all the gains since the end of 2013. that is quite remarkable. that is the benchmark that has done nothing for two years. you're thinking about picking up the pieces -- where do you go? yogesh: we look to allocate capital in this market, but slowly. panic, it was disappointing to see the u.s. market selloff in the last hour. that was primarily retail driven in hedge funds. we are encouraged by the chinese markets overnight. the markets only closed down 1.2%. bearing in mind the intraday swings, you have to remember that china doubled between autumn and april. last year, it was up 52%.

we are seeing a correction in an overbought market. as far as you're concerned, where are we in the cycle? an extremely which herbal market showing immense sense of fragility? are we at the tipping point towards the end of the bull market? yogesh: no. i wouldn't have called it a bull market. the u.s. is a $60 trillion economy growing at 4.2%, inflation at 1.2%, things are slowly improving. we see no reason for a rate hike, if there is a rate hike it will be a signal to the market to say, we'd like to slow things down, but there is no need to slow things down. if we do see a rate hike is likely to come next year. jonathan: you mentioned vix. it's been doing nothing for months and we all sat here saying why not.

the big take away -- the volatility is back. it will stay for a while? yogesh: yes. you are seeing elevated levels of volatility. this is a time not to sell. it is a dangerous time to be selling in this market because it's not based on fundamentals. jonathan: a dangerous time to be buying? yogesh: probably. we're inclined to wait and see what happens. it represents a good entry point. jonathan: in the two minutes we have left in this segment -- if i could ask you to catch one falling knife, what would it be? yogesh: probably energy-related stocks. we like the fact that oil has bottomed. the market was caught offguard because of the oversupply issue. it slowed down to about 200,000 barrels a day. the iran additional supply equates to about 3 million. we like the fact that energy atsks -- we are looking at going forward and i think it's an interesting time. jonathan: some people would be

frightened. what is your time? energy stocks have been slammed that they could get worse -- how long will you sit on them? yogesh: it's the long-term purchase, getting european energy stocks. this is a good alternative to going out there and taking risk when there is high levels of volatility. jonathan: thank you very much. yogesh, always a pleasure. still to come on the program, betting on a merger. a get together -- we will break down the m&a after the break. stocks are up 18%. the wider equity markets getting absolutely slammed. ink, down by 1.7%. frankfurt is down. who saw that coming? not many people in the city of london. ♪

jonathan: good morning and welcome back. i am live from bloomberg's european headquarters. 30 minutes into the session. let's look at the markets -- unbelievable stuff. the stoxx 600 down. the biggest drop since 2011. we are down by two percentage points. the dax is down, south of 10,000 points. the pboc just can't stop the rock in china. epic swings -- another volatile session, the shanghai composite down by 1.27%. switch up the boards -- the euro kissing a january high just the other day, back to lower. germany down,

brent crude down to $43 a barrel. let's get to the top stories here at bloomberg. chinese stocks fell again today, following the steepest five-day drop in nearly 20 years. shanghai composite closed down by one point 3% even after the central bank cut interest rates for the sixth time since november. chinese equities have lost $5 trillion since june, almost half the value. the alibaba ceo is calling on staff to ignore the plunging stock price, saying it's not the first or last time the shares will dip. he wrote a memo to 35,000 employees about a focus on customers. it was an intense session for u.s. stocks yesterday -- nearly a 3% rally on the s&p 500 crumbling in the final hours. that extended the losing streak to six straight days, the

longest since 2012. the index has lost more than 11%. elsewhere, back in europe, busy day for the gamblers. betfair and paddy power announce their intentions to get together. paddy power shareholders were down 62% of the combined group. been busy and we are joined on set. consolidation -- if you had blinked you would have missed it. merger after merger after merger -- what is driving it now? >> you probably wouldn't have expected this, but you may well have been able to predict it. like you say, consolidation is the name of the game in batting at the moment. >> when i look at these get-togethers, a high street -- this merger interests me

a little bit. paddy power is trying to expand, going online, and it quite clearly needs to get much, much bigger to fight some of these companies. it was in the driving seat? paul: really, what you're looking at is a situation where it doesn't matter whether you are online or off-line. you've got to have skin in this business now. you have regulation really increasing quite dramatically, taxation -- paddy power -- the impact of taxation is quite incredible. they have been challenged quite heavily. what they have to do is get together. it doesn't matter whether you are online or off-line, you have to get together, you have to find a way to drive efficiencies out of those businesses. all these guys are looking to increase their marketing, increasing these crowded spaces, driving efficiencies by getting bigger. jonathan: wage consolidation -- i looked back at the industry,

and there was a company coming from a position of weakness. when i look at these two companies, it's not clear to me -- he was in the position of strength and he was in the position of weakness? paul: these two companies are both coming from a position of strength. the results will show you that. like i said, the impact on paddy power's result of increased taxation was quite dramatic. even allowing for that, they managed to drive an increase of 33%. taking out taxes that would have been 68%. they are both coming out of a strong place. if you look at how this will be structured, ceo, cfo both coming from betfair. paddy power will have the first name of chairman. so it does look very much like a merger, both coming from a considerable position of strength. jonathan: fascinating situation. the fight for scale, a fight for strength. paul, thank you very much for

joining us this morning. let's bring up the stock prices. both of them absolutely surging. paddy power is higher this morning, up 18%. betfair up by 19%. now, thek about wpp world's largest advertising company reporting a 7% increase in first-half sales, but concerns remain about business exposure to emerging markets. with morris caroline hyde. caroline: numbers are coming in pretty but we want to get into the ditty gritty of what's driving this company in terms of emerging market exposure. first, it's first-half results -- up about 7% overall, and the dividends were ahead of expectations. ,his is the best paid man potentially handing a little bit back to the investors today. stock is up by 8/10 of a percent of the market falls.

we are looking at where geographically this country is making headwind, or perhaps falling behind. north america is outperforming -- 17% increase. the dollar strength did help. europe is a bit of a concern, off by 8%, probably some greek turmoil there. but notably, there is a slowdown in where the company has been expanding. chinaerging markets -- in and russia -- is where this company is pointing things out, coming under pressure. interesting comments coming from some people. it is statement -- let's delve into this emerging market, let's look at the exposure for wpp versus its peers. certainly, it is a third of its revenue in the last quarter. zil, india, russia, china make up 12% of the revenue. this is where the pain was felt -- southeast asia, central thepe, china slowing down,

pressure-ukraine crisis impacting eastern europe. that is where the slowdown happened, and it is noted that china is wpp's third-biggest market. fascinating statements coming out, saying the hard or soft landing, particularly in china, the uncertainty demands caution. but there is a note on international currency, saying the international currency wars have not helped by black or gray -- industryant of the when it comes to advertising, the biggest player, half $1 trillion market, they are welcomed to see what is going on and they say this is not helping. let's have a bit of an insight into china, because the world's second-largest advertising market -- that is why wpp is investing so hard, why they have 15,000 employees there. the largest exposure to china

compared to its peers. it has the biggest exposure to again, sounding optimistic about the future. unabashed bulls on china and brazil. yes, there is concern about the devaluation, overall they say we remain firm in our commitment to that part of the world. jonathan: thank you very much. coming up, we will keep it on china -- a double whammy. what industry with huge exposure to the china slowdown in the forward crew. ♪

jonathan: good morning and welcome back to bloomberg tv. i'm jonathan ferro. thenight this morning, shanghai swung between gains and losses and finished lower, even after the central bank cut interest rates for the fifth time since november. we are all struggling to keep up. earlier on we heard from gloom, doom editor -- he spoke with anna edwards. >> a friend of mine just issued a report which i find very funny in terms of its title. he writes, "rescuing the rescue package." this is letter days. throwing more money at something

that has already gone wrong. is injuring --at if not a recession -- been a very meaningful slowdown, where trendline growth in china, instead of being between eight and 12 -- a tweet a percent of 12% will be in the neighborhood of 4%. at the present time we aren't growing at all if you look at sales,at smart watch industrial production and export. we have a meaningful slowdown, and in the meantime, the average p.e. of stocks is still very high. the indices have a lower p.e. because of the banks but the banks have their own problems. my stance is that the chinese economy, which was the driver of

--bal growth after 2000 don't forget, china consumed 5% of industrial commodities in 1990, 12% of global commodities in 2000, and now close to 50% -- that has a huge impact on the world, it was what was producing whatrces, and we know happened to the economies of brazil and other resource producers. -- is 4% your growth estimate, then, for china this year, marc? what effect you to commodity crises? well, it depends which growth numbers you mean. the ones published by the government will be 7.8% or something like that. none of the investment banks will challenge these numbers, because they all do business in china, and they don't want to

have bad standing with the chinese government. observers ofmies, what is really happening on the thatd, will noknow growth is very slow. are we in a, 4%, recession? that is difficult to tell in an economy of 1.3 billion people, with so many different provinces. make more sense, in your mind, for the central bank to be cutting interest rates for austerity as we try to prop up the stock market? are the moves we are seeing from regulators moving in the right direction in your view? marc: well, it depends. there are some responsible central bankers in the world, like in india, but they are very reluctant to cut interest rates. they have currency stability in mind rather than propping up

stock prices. i think that is a very important points to consider. what is actually best for the majority of the population? we have had in the u.s. six years of zero interest rates, and what does the economy have to show for it? very, very little, considering all the stimulus packages, the zero interest rates. we have a very lopsided recovery, where the high-end sector has done well in the typical man on the street hasn't. jonathan: it's nice to see that the government in china is handling this but things could be even tougher for the nation's oil majors. companies reporting amidst collapsing crude prices. edy tobring in will kenn make sense of what these companies are up against. what can we expect? i know the names, i don't know

the specifics of the company. will: we have sinopec reporting, and they may do ok because cheap has cheap raw materials. another only drills oil and gas and they will have a difficult work quarter. jonathan: when i look at how this has impacted western companies, you see guys with the big downstream business, doing particularly well. is the effects therefore similar and what's happening with china? up to a point. with all the slowdown in china, energy demand is holding up pretty well. gasoline is up 17% year-over-year, which is a strong number. jonathan: when you look at what's going on politically -- the anticorruption drive -- how are some of these companies

advocated? will: this is a big issue for petrochina. withhad a real clear out 10 senior executives being shown the door. will be veryt interesting with a report tomorrow -- it will be the first time we have heard from many german. look what he's dealing with. jonathan: the headwinds are clear, and as you have just touched upon, it is quite hard to get a read on what's going on with china. you can look at some of the price volume going in, but if we strip all the prices out and look at volume and the amount of oil that's going into china, it stays right up there. it's staying consistently right up there. what is going on question mark what is the demand story? will: a few things to say -- no one is quite sure. the crew members are being inflated by the fact that the chinese government is trying to fill up. we have supertankers going to china to fill up tanks so they can go like they have in the

states. earnings this week -- it will be interesting to look at some of the numbers. if i wanted to get a read on the chinese economy i would be looking at chemicals, industrial lubricants, boring sector but it gives you real insight into how the great workshops of the chinese economy are doing. jonathan: which company would give me the better insight into the chinese -- will: i think you want to look at sinopec today and how down it goes. willjonathan: always always a privilege. come, we hear from our guests across bloomberg tv about the opportunity in the u.s. market amid a feed of volatility. a 400 point rally erased. an ugly hour to the end of trading. we will look ahead after this short break. ♪

>> prices are high, as the market will probably have diminished performance. still positive, maybe 3% a year, but not as great as normal. >> there's a lot of value that has been created in the last couple days, so i think you will see more volatility as we go through, until you get greater clarity. i also think if you ever want to return there was a lot of stuff for sale now. >> we will have these price movements going up and down.

take your names, know that well, look for companies that will be sponsored. great management, great business. cash flow and income streams that support the price of a future price. jonathan: those are some of our about thelking volatility and opportunity in the u.s. stock market at the moment. 52 minutes into the session. the dax is down by 1.5%. i want to check in on the european equity markets, and get some top stock market movers. caroline: and then in a story driving some of these stocks. most have been falling but there are two obvious out performers. that there is surging to its highest surge on record. meanwhile, paddy power has the biggest mover of the scene. why the surge? the merger. these two juggernauts are coming together. we are already hearing how the company will be divvied out.

position,ts the ceo willaddy power chairmen become the chairmen. a flurry of m&a in this sector -- every month or seems to be a new one. start, had the ongoing fighting it out, and another deal just last month. the deals keep on coming, the consolidation is rising. transoceane -- limited. trade in the u.s., down almost 10%. significant underperformance. the world's top offshore rig operator. this is all about oil. this is about a company taking desperate measures in desperate times, halting investor payouts, only agreed at the previous agm. they are looking at 2 billion swiss francs asset impairments.

oil prices crashing really cut hurt it. jonathan: thank you very much. plenty of movers out there. tv, the polls are coming up next with manus cranny and france we look while. croix.francine la are we playing up the back of this in europe? manus: it was quite incredible. you played those various voices, talking about volatility in value. whether you have the tolerance to take that volatility. we are down to short-term trading, which is more than eight hours at any one time. it's a question of how much they were forced to divest versus how much risk do you want to take on a day-to-day basis. ,e have stephen gallo coming in

along with michael metcalf. is are yoution there looking at a political crisis in china, an economic crisis in china? what is it that the markets need to see coming from china which will sate the view that they have got a grip on their economic downturn? or is it that markets are merely pressing the slowdown. bang, slap, wallop. now you have policy and removed from these lows. jonathan: it's remarkable. you have a market route, then a policy response that looks like panic, that there is a severe problem, the whole idea that we are approaching a point of political crisis -- that is the extreme. but when you look at the moves overnight in china, even with the rate cut, they can't get the shanghai composite to finish in the green. china. in

manus: and when caroline was going through the three top stock movers, the three gaining companies -- you roll the dice in the gaming space. but really, what you've got is a whole view that the china growth story is exporting deflation. the twitter question of the day -- jonathan: i don't mind, please. ok?s: i can pay rent, [laughter] what is the role of central banks in 2015? who's got the circuit breaker? jonathan: please do answer. they join you on the other side of this break. you can follow me on twitter. another choppy session here this morning. the biggest drop since 2008 followed by the figures drop since 2011, then we roll over on

the stoxx 600, down by 1.8%. it's only wednesday -- best of luck for the rest of your day. ♪

francine: shaken and stirred. day of trading, chinese stocks extends the first five day drop since 2006. manus: stocks follow the decline. indices across the continent are in the red. francine: all bets are on. betfair agreed to merge in the latest consolidation of the gambling industry. welcome to "the pulse" live from bloomberg's european headquarters in london. manus: