Европейские фондовые индексы резко упали по всем направлениям в понедельник, после понижения рейтинга греческого долга агентством FITCH в пятницу, и понижение прогноза по рейтингу Италии агентством S&P.

European stocks fell sharply across the board on Monday after a downgrade of Greek's debt ratings by Fitch on Friday and a weekend downgrade of the outlook for  Italy's  rating by  Standard & Poor's. The Italy FTSE MIB (XX:FTSEMIB) sank nearly 3%. Meanwhile,  Spain's  IBEX 35 index (XX:IBEX) fell 1.3% after the ruling Socialist party suffered heavy losses at weekend elections. The Stoxx Europe 600 index (ST:SXXP) fell 1.1% to 276.61. The France CAC 40 index (FR:PX1) fell 1.5% to 3,936.40 and the German DAX 30 index (DX:DAX) dropped 1.4% to 7,164.28. Banks were the main decliners, led by a 5.1% drop for  Commerzbank AG  (DE:CBK), while airlines also tumbled, amid news of new volcanic activity in  Iceland .