New Delhi - The collapse of major Wall Street firms is likely to result in a tightening of liquidity, adverse impact on the banking sector and a slowdown for information-technology firms that serve customers in financial sectors, analysts said Wednesday.

The Reserve Bank of India, which had net foreign reserves of 288.8 billion dollars in the week ending September 5, has already taken measures to support the rupee which rose by 60 paisa against the dollar on Wednesday.

The central bank also barred Lehman's India subsidiary from remitting money to its parent company.

Seoul - Shares rebounded Wednesday on the Seoul stock exchange in reaction to US government plans to bail out the troubled insurance giant American International Group Inc (AIG).

Berlin - The effects of the Wall Street financial crisis on Germany have been moderate so far, Chancellor Angela Merkel told the Bundestag parliament in Berlin Wednesday.

In a debate on the 2009 federal budget, she said credit to German business had been significantly expanded.

The government was closely watching the crisis and consulting German banking leaders and other governments.

"An open economy like Germany's won't remain completely unaffected by this," she said.

Karachi - The Pakistan rupee on Wednesday plunged to a new record low of 77.66 against the US dollar amid rising tension with the United States over military operations inside Pakistani territory, traders said.

The rupee finally closed at 77.40 to a dollar in the open market but traders said it would slump to 78 by Friday as worsening relations with the US, the biggest donor, could cloud prospects of Pakistan receiving urgent financial aid from multilateral agencies to boost fledging foreign currency reserves.

The 30-share index, BSE Sensex continued to trade pessimistically as intense selling pressure was seen in banking realty, FMCG and metal stocks, whereas auto stock managed to trade in the positive terrain.

Midcap and Smallcap index fell 1.29% and 0.81% respectively.

At 2.54 p.m., Sensex lost 221.15 points or 1.64% at 13,297.65. It also touched a high of 13,620.74 and a low of 13,127.96.

In contrast, the broad based Nifty stood at 4,016.65, down 58.25 points. It also touched a high of 4,116.70 and a low of 3,974.60.

The overall market breadth was negative as it saw 928 advancements as against 1,644 declinations.

London/New York - Britain's Barclays bank has agreed to buy some of the core assets of stricken US investment bank Lehman Brothers for 1 billion pounds (1.75 billion dollars), the two banks said Wednesday.

Barclays had bought Lehman's North American investment banking and trading unit for 250 million dollars, and paid 1.5 billion dollars for its New York headquarters and two data centres following negotiations in New York.