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Shares and oil prices around the world have seen further falls, sparked by
renewed fears over the health of the global economy.
In China, the authorities intervened again on the stock market to little
effect. Shares in Shanghai fell 1.5%.
And in Washington, expectations of a US interest rate rise dimmed after Federal
Reserve policymakers said the economy was not ready yet.
European markets in Paris and Frankfurt were down 1% in morning trade.
London's benchmark FTSE 100 index shed 0.5%, while the price of Brent crude oil
fell 1.7% to $46.35 a barrel. US crude was down 1.4% at $40.54.
Rate rise 'approaching'
On Wednesday evening, the Fed released minutes from its meeting on 28-29 July,
showing that one policymaker was ready to vote for an interest rate rise at the
meeting.
Overall, the Fed thought conditions for a US rate rise "were approaching", but
the economy was not ready yet.
Other policymakers remained concerned that inflation would remain weak because
of the strong dollar and falling commodity prices, which act as a double
depressant on imports.
The Fed's key interest rate has been kept near zero since December 2008.
There has been speculation that the Fed will raise rates at its meeting in
September, and last month Fed chair Janet Yellen said she thought a rate rise
this year was likely.
Following the release of the Fed's minutes, US stocks rallied briefly but then
fell back, while the dollar weakened on the currency markets. The Dow Jones
index ended Wednesday trading down 0.9%.
China slowdown fears
The committee also cited China as a potential problem, saying that a "material
slowdown" in the Chinese economy could affect the US economic outlook.
The FOMC's meeting came before last week's action by China to weaken its
currency.
After days of volatility, Chinese equities traded lower once again on Thursday,
despite Beijing's efforts to calm markets.
The mainland's benchmark Shanghai Composite was 1.5% down to 3,735.92 points.
The negative open comes after the index had seen strong volatility since the
beginning of the week.
Traders appeared not to respond to efforts by the central bank to provide more
liquidity to stabilise markets.
BBC business editor Robert Peston says many economists believe China's official
7% growth rate is a serious overstatement of the underlying reality.
He says even a fractional rise in US rates would be uncomfortable when the huge
economies of China, Japan and the eurozone have been weakening.
Inflation focus
In assessing the strength of the US economy, the Fed has been keeping an eye on
the US jobs market - where the unemployment rate has been falling and is now
5.3%. However, inflation is still below the Fed's target of 2%.
The minutes from the Federal Open Market Committee's (FOMC) July meeting said:
"Most judged that the conditions for policy firming had not yet been achieved,
but they noted that conditions were approaching that point."
The committee noted that the labour market "had continued to improve, with
solid job gains and declining unemployment".
However, when assessing inflation, it said that "some members continued to see
downside risks to inflation from the possibility of further dollar appreciation
and declines in commodity prices".
The FOMC said it would continue to monitor inflation "closely, with almost all
members indicating that they would need to see more evidence that economic
growth was sufficiently strong and labour market conditions had firmed enough
for them to feel reasonably confident that inflation would return to the
committee's longer-run objective over the medium term".
Inflation figures released earlier on Wednesday showed that consumer prices
rose by 0.1% in July, and were 0.2% higher from a year ago.
So-called core inflation, which ignores changes in food and energy prices, also
rose 0.1% last month, but was up 1.8% over the year.