Wall Street is bracing itself for more shocks after a week during which equities slid to their lowest level in five years, further eroding the retirement security of millions of Americans and driving investors out of stocks into bonds and savings accounts.
Scepticism about company accounting helped propel the Dow Jones Industrial Average to its fourth largest weekly drop, while the Nasdaq Composite and the Standard & Poor's 500 index fell to their lowest levels since 1997.
One of the most telling images of last week was of President George W Bush giving a speech to Wall Street to restore market confidence while the bottom of the television screens showed the Dow continuing to fall.
The credibility of the White House corporate reform drive has been undermined by questions about the past business practices of the president and members of his administration.
When the president's new corporate-crime task force met last week, at its head was the former director at a credit-card company that paid more than $400 million (€408 million) to settle allegations of unfair and deceptive business practices.
Officials said that Deputy Attorney General Larry Thompson was unaware of problems at Providian Financial until they were unearthed by US regulators, and he then played a lead role in pushing the company to recompense consumers.
The US Senate voted on Friday to ban personal loans from companies to top officials and directors, while the White House defended $180,000 in low-interest loans that Mr Bush received while a director of Harken Energy in Texas.
The Senate is pushing for measures which go beyond those proposed by Mr Bush.
They include the creation of an independent private body with authority to discipline auditors.
Quarterly earnings calls by several major companies this week will determine whether the market recovers or settles into bear territory.
Companies reporting include Apple Computer, Delta Air, Kraft Foods, Ford, IMB, Motorola, General Motors, eBay, Microsoft, Sun Microsystems, Intel, Broadcom, Gateway, Nokia, Sprint and Ericsson.
Analysts expect earnings to rise 3 per cent in the second quarter, the first increase since the start of last year, but faith in corporate figures is at an historic low following an escalating series of accounting scandals.
