6pm update  Northern Rock shares plummet  Customers of Northern
Rock queue outside the Kingston branch of the company on Castle
Street, in order to take their money out of their accounts
Northern Rock: queues. Photograph: Cate Gillon/Getty Images
Shares in Northern Rock went into freefall today as the run on
the bank gathered pace with investors rushing to dump the stock.
The company's shares nosedived, plummeting 41% to 257p at one
stage. By the close, the shares had edged back to 282.75p, still
down 35.45% for the day.  This follows Friday's hefty 32% drop
and means that the group, Britain's fifth-largest mortgage
lender, has lost almost 80% of its stock market value since the
start of the year when it was valued at more than £5bn.  There
were heavy losses at other banks, sending the FTSE 100 index of
leading shares down by more than 100 points at one stage.
Alliance & Leicester, which suffered sharp falls on Friday, lost
another 32% and Bradford & Bingley was more than 15% lower. HBOS
lost 5.47%.  By the