President Bush tried once again to reassure nervous spectators that the global financial crisis will be responded to by world leaders after world leaders gathered to discuss collective action to restore confidence in the world's markets.

"We recognize that the turmoil in the financial markets is affected all our citizens," said Bush. "All of us recognize this is a serious global crisis that requires serious global response for the good of our people."

On Friday, finance ministers from the world's Group of Seven nations met to discuss plans to stabilize global markets, although no specific plans of action were announced with the meeting's conclusion.

"The G-7 agrees today that the current situation calls for urgent and exceptional actions," the leaders said in a statement. "We commit to continue working together to stabilize financial markets and restore the flow of credit, to support global economic growth."

The G-7, comprised of policy makers from the U.S., Canada, U.K., Germany, France, Italy and Japan, met after stocks around the globe plunged more than 20 percent. The Dow Jones industrial average fell 18 percent, for its worst decline in a week in history.

The plan of action devised by the finance ministers includes using all available resources to prevent important institutions from failing, unfreezing credit and money markets, ensure deposit insurance, and restarting secondary markets for mortgages and other assets.

On Friday, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said the U.S. government would take the authority granted to it by the $700 bailout bill stabilize financial institutions. President Bush also discussed the previously mentioned process of directing capital into troubled banks, the latest in a series of efforts to restore confidence and stabilize banks.

So far, central banks around the world have cut benchmark rates and increased insurance limits for deposits, although the action has not done much to stabilize the markets.