Finance ministers and central bank governors of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) held an emergency meeting yesterday to discuss coordination of their response to a global downturn that threatens to brake their region’s six-year economic boom.

The states, preparing for a single currency by an unlikely 2010 deadline, emerged from the meeting with few public statements on how they would work together.

"The likely effects of the global crisis can be dealt with through the measures we have already taken," Qatar Minister of Finance H E Yousuf Hussain Kamal said. "The crisis proves how much we need a single currency and that a single central bank should be a supervisory body."

The agenda for the one-day meeting included discussion of new steps to shore up confidence in their banking sectors while reviewing regional investment plans. Some Gulf states have guaranteed bank deposits, eased lending restrictions, set up emergency funding facilities for their banks and invested money in ailing stocks.

"There’s been no coordination in the policy announcements so far," said Paul Gamble, head of research at Jadwa Investment.