Monday Papers: Financial services institutions slash investment plans -- other news

Fnancial services institutions slash investment plans.

 * Financial services institutions are slashing investment plans and trimming jobs in preparation for a 'long siege' convinced they have not yet seen the worst of the credit squeeze, according to CBI/PwC report

 * House prices fell an average of 0.2% in March, according to the latest survey from Hometrack

 * President Bush and Gordon Brown agree to step up co-operation over the crisis in financial markets, setting up a US-UK working group that will develop proposals to monitor and regulate the banking systems

 * Alistair Darling calls for cross-border bank scrutiny

 * G7 to press big banks to reveal extent of losses in credit squeeze

 * US Federal Reserve is examining the Nordic bank nationalisation of the 1990s as a possible interim solution to the US financial crisis

 * Tension in Zimbabwe as opposition claims victory

 * Lehman Bros plans to sue Marubeni, one of Japan's biggest trading firms for $352 million after the US bank fell victim to an alleged fraud perpetrated by two former employees of the Japanese group

 * Sovereign wealth funds grew 18% last year as commodity prices surged and the foreign exchange reserves of some Asian countries continued to rise, according to research