shaped," said David Brown, economist at Bear Stearns. "The world industrial cycle has considerably weakened over the past few months, with Euroland the worst affected," said Nicolas Sobczak, economist at Goldman Sachs. Also unsettling investors was an OECD indicator showing that the outlook for all seven of the world's leading economies had weakened in March, as well as China's denial of a report that it was mulling a revaluation of the yuan. Markets had hoped that Chinese action on its currency would bolster the health of the global economy. On Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial average and the Nasdaq Composite momentarily reeled on news the White House and Congress had been evacuated and that fighter jets were scrambling over the U.S. capital in response to a feared threat from an unidentified aircraft. The news came out after European markets had shut. U.S. markets quickly regained their composure as U.S. authorities gave the all clear within minutes of the scare and allowed staff to return to their offices. A U.S. official identified the plane as a light Cessna aircraft. In the markets, BP and rival Royal Dutch/Shell fell as a sharp drop in crude oil prices raised worries of lower profits for oil majors. --More 2142 Local Time 1842 GMT
