European stocks plunge by more than 2%

LONDON—Europe’s main stock markets plunged by more than 2.0 percent on Thursday, while safe-haven gold hit a record peak, amid mounting concern that the world could be heading for another sharp downturn, dealers said.

Markets later trimmed their losses in afternoon deals but remained deep in the red. London’s FTSE 100 index was down 2.03 percent at 5,471.24 points and in Paris the CAC 40 tumbled 2.0 percent to 3,386.35, while Frankfurt’s DAX 30 lost 1.65 percent to 6,532.73 points.