Quiz: "breakneck" or "knee-jerk"?

The correct answer is:

knee-jerk

The markets continue to suffer after a knee-jerk reaction to the downgrade of America's credit rating and the eurozone crisis.

A knee-jerk reaction is an immediate one that hasn't been considered carefully.

Following heavy market losses last week, the downgrade of America's credit rating and the latest moves to deal with the eurozone crisis have intensified a serious lack of confidence on trading floors.

Peter Esho, chief market analyst at City Index, told the BBC: "You can't control it. You have the onset of fear in the market. There are a lot of things that don't make sense."

Fear leads to knee-jerk reactions, and panic selling has led to shares plummeting; banks are among the worst hit. On the bond markets, the yield on Spanish and Italian government bonds has also fallen.

Breakneck means extremely fast and dangerous.

"I'm not surprised John had an accident. He cycles at breakneck speed."