Chris Beauchamp, Chief Market Analyst at IG wrote:

"European equities are plumbing new depths this morning, while the FTSE 100 is down 60 points in mid-morning trading.

The sell-off has resumed across markets, as yesterday's brief bounce passes quickly into history. As the number of earnings misses rises, investors have continued to flee from European equities. If this was an earlier time, the calls for ECB intervention would probably start around now, but investors are all too aware that the ECB's role of riding to the rescue has come to an end, and the bank seems disinclined to intervene in the Italy budget crisis. All eyes will be on US markets now - a much lower open is on the cards, and we should expect the losses to intensify. Given the corporate and economic backdrop, this is still likely to result in a new move higher, at least for US equities, but we are due some hefty volatility first."