Despite a strong 0.9% rally on Wall Street overnight, the Australian market has today suffered its fifth straight fall – 50 points or 0.8% – after Centro Properties and Centro Retail Trust went into a trading halt pending an announcement.

Skittish investors are fearing the worst.

The Australian newspaper is having a belter of a week for corporate scoops. Thursday’s report about ASIC investigating Centro contributed to yesterday’s share price dives and now Centro has gone into a trading halt, the two vehicles nominally being worth $2 billion.

Will they ever trade again?

Centro is just part of this extraordinary global credit crunch which saw some more remarkable developments over night.

Bank of America, which on Wednesday night was almost $1 billion underwater on its earlier $US2 billion bail out of teetering US mortgage giant Countrywide, is now reported to be negotiating to buy the whole disaster.

Countrywide shares soared $US2.63 to $US7.75 last night – but this 50% gain still values it at only $US4.8 billion, well shy of last February’s peak of $US26 billion.

While everyone is keen to point out how Australia is largely unaffected by direct sub-prime exposures, The Australian splashed on Thursday with a great scoop revealing that our Big Four banks had collectively pumped $850 million into Countrywide last year. Today’s follow-up points out that it is unsecured and that new Treasurer Wayne Swan has held discussions with US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson.

This really does smell like a co-ordinated global rescue.

Today, The Australian’s front page includes a Wall Street Journal scoop that Citigroup and Merrill Lynch are seeking another $14 billion in bail outs from foreign governments. Why doesn’t Australia’s Future Fund get involved for once?

The remarkable thing about the Americans is the rapidity of their response to a crisis. Witness the way Warren Buffett has charged into the bond insurance business just as talk emerged that the major players could collapse, thereby dramatically escalating the crisis.

The previous bail out investments of Wall Street’s great names have come from undemocratic governments in China, Singapore and the Middle East. These deals have been announced at the same time as the massive write-downs – usually without any leaks.

Given that investment banks are largely just capitalised reputation, retaining confidence is vital, so this leak of the latest negotiations won’t help Citi and Merrills.

I’ll be discussing all of this and the business news of the week with other financial journalists for an hour on the new Sky Business Channel at 9am tomorrow as Helen Dalley attempts to front “The Insiders of business”.