MILAN (AP) Global stocks fell again yesterday as fears of a possible US recession combined with ongoing worries over Europe’s debt crisis, which is stoking acute fears over the continent’s banking sector.However, smaller than anticipated losses on Wall Street helped European markets recoup a large chunk of their earlier losses by the close.In Europe, Britain’s FTSE 100 closed down one percent at 5,040.76 while Germany’s DAX fell 2.2 percent to 5,480. France’s CAC-40 ended down 1.9 percent at 3,016.99.In the US, the Dow Jones industrial average was down 0.4 percent at 10,944 while the broader Standard & Poor’s 500 index fell 0.2 percent at 1,138. Futures markets had been predicting far bigger declines earlier.The market turmoil of the last two days has dashed any hopes of a quiet second half of August a normally quiet period when trading dries up until the US returns from the Labour Day holiday in early September.Financial markets have wrestled for several weeks with fears that a new recession in the US is in the offing. Another round of soft economic data further spooked investors all round the world. A woeful manufacturing survey on Thursday from the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia renewed US recession fears in particular.A parallel concern centres on Europe after a Franco-German summit earlier this week failed to persuade investors a convincing fix to the spiraling debt crisis was imminent. The leaders promised further economic integration but no concrete measures like eurobonds, which would spread the risk among the 17 nations using the common currency.“This week has seen a continuation of the trend of weaker than expected data and political reaction to the European problems which pretty much amounts to ‘Let’s have a get-together a couple of times a year,’ “ said Gary Jenkins, an analyst at Evolution Securities.”There’s also been some calm in the currency markets, with the euro up 0.7 percent at $1.44 and the dollar down 0.2 percent at 76.47 yen.Earlier, Asian shares also took a beating following the big retreat on Thursday in Europe and the US.Japan’s Nikkei 225 index dropped 2.5 percent to 8,719.24 and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng slid 3.1 percent to 19,399.92.Mainland Chinese shares tracked losses elsewhere, with shares in coal, oil and cement leading the decline. The Shanghai Composite Index lost one percent to 2,534.36 after dipping almost two percent earlier in the day. The Shenzhen Composite Index lost 0.8 percent to 1,133.84.Oil prices continued recovered as the selling pressure in stock markets eased. Benchmark oil for September delivery was up 26 cents at $82.64 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange.