The Barclays' rebound has come to a halt. While other banks are holding on to much of their earlier gains, Barclays is now down around 11%.
Its shares have fallen 7.1p at 59p, and if there is no recovery before the market closes, it would mark the eighth successive daily decline. It seems the shares have been spooked by the reports that the bank's Middle Eastern investors (from Qatar and Abu Dhabi) would end up with 55% of Barclays, if the bank decided it needed to raise more capital. However the clause in the original investment document relating to this pre-emption right is believed to run only until this June.
Whatever the case, the bank's attempts to reassure the market on profits and its capital ratios since Friday's share price slump have been to little avail so far.
But Lloyds Banking Group is up 4.7p at 49.8p on hopes it might, after all, avoid full nationalisation, while HSBC is 17.5p higher at 533p despite earlier suggestions it might be planning to raise cash in Hong Kong. Traders believe this is wide of the mark.
However it is clear that this volatility in banking shares is set to continue until such time as the full extent of their toxic assets is known. And it seems no one - certainly not the banks themselves - knows how long this will take.
Meanwhile, leading shares have come off their best levels after mobile phone maker Nokia reported a worse than expected fall in fourth quarter profits. So after reaching 4153.88, the FTSE 100 is now up 28.42 at 4088.30.
Traders are also unnerved by the continuing fall in sterling, and are reluctant to take risks until the extent of the decline is known.
