The startling figure was suggested yesterday by the chief US economist at Goldman Sachs, Jan Hatzius, who said that an estimated $400bn (£290bn) in losses on mortgages would be magnified as lenders reacted to stay within their solvency requirements.

“Even a $400bn loss does not look all that large compared to the vast size of the US financial markets, and one sometimes hears that it is just equivalent to one bad day in the stock market,” Mr Hatzius told clients. “But this analogy is wrong. There is a big difference between stock market losses, which are mostly borne by long-only investors, and mortgage credit losses, which are mostly borne by leveraged investors such as banks, broker-dealers, hedge funds, and government-sponsored enterprises.”