A look at economic developments and stock market activity around the world Friday:BRUSSELS, Belgium -- The 15 countries that use the euro are officially in a recession, the European Union said, as their economies shrank for a second straight quarter because of the global financial crisis and sinking demand. The euro zone shrank by 0.2 percent sequentially in both the second and third quarters; two successive quarters of negative growth is a common definition of a recession. Year-over-year, the euro-zone grew 0.8 percent in the third quarter and 1.4 percent in the second. As a whole, the 27-nation EU has so far escaped recession thanks to growth in eastern Europe. But it shrank 0.2 percent sequentially in the third quarter after zero growth in the second quarter. Year-over-year, third-quarter growth totaled 1.7 percent and second-quarter growth was 0.8 percent.
LONDON -- The number of Brits petitioning for bankruptcy jumped 7 percent in the third quarter, while company failures rose 13 percent, as the financial crisis hiked the cost of loans, Britain's Ministry of Justice reported. The FTSE 100 index of leading British shares closed only 63.76 points, or 1.5 percent, higher at 4,232.97. Earlier it had been some 170 points higher.
MOSCOW -- Russian stocks closed mixed, with one major exchange recovering some of the recent days' massive losses. The RTS jumped 3.9 percent to 644 points while the benchmark MICEX closed down 1 percent at 592.1 points.
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