Financial crisis summit set for November 15: W.House

By Jeremy Pelofsky

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President George W. Bush will host world leaders on November 15 to discuss the financial crisis and brainstorm on how to prevent another meltdown, the White House said on Wednesday.

Governments have thrown hundreds of billions of dollars at the financial crisis to try to prevent a global recession, help thaw frozen credit markets and calm jittery stock markets that have swung wildly in recent weeks.

Pressed by European allies also to start work quickly on overhauling the financial system, Bush agreed to host the November 15 summit -- the first of a planned series. The White House played down the idea that quick fixes would emerge at the talks, to be held in the Washington area.

The leaders will discuss progress in addressing the crisis, analyze its underlying causes, set principles for reforms and instruct working groups to begin developing recommendations for those solutions, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said.

"I don't believe that you'll have any details coming out of this meeting in terms of things everyone agrees to at the first meeting," she said. Bush will host a dinner the night before at the White House but the venue for the summit has not been set.

Invited will be leaders of the G20, which includes the Group of Seven major industrialized nations and key emerging economies like China, Brazil, Saudi Arabia and India. Leaders of the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, United Nations and the Financial Stability Forum have also been invited.

"Everybody will come with their ideas and the president recognizes that every country is going to have a responsibility but not every country is going to have the same solution," Perino said, adding that the United States would come with its own recommendations.

The summit will convene 11 days after the November 4 U.S. election that will decide who succeeds Bush in January. Perino said the White House will seek input from the winner, either Republican John McCain or Democrat Barack Obama.

"We don't know what that president will want or not want to do, and so we'll just leave that open for now," Perino said.

Obama welcomed the summit announcement, saying "America must lead and other nations must be part of the solution too."

McCain also endorsed the gathering, his spokeswoman Jill Hazelbaker said, adding that it was "an important opportunity to take urgent steps to recovery and prevention of similar crises in the future."

SARKOZY WELCOMES SUMMIT DETAILS

Details for the gathering emerged four days after Bush conferred with French President Nicolas Sarkozy and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and they announced a series of summits to address the crisis.

Welcoming the summit details, Sarkozy said the meeting would be "followed by several others aimed at rebuilding the international financial system and making sure the current crisis does not happen again thanks to better regulation and more efficient surveillance of all players."

Perino said that Bush was committed to several gatherings but it was unclear whether another would take place before he leaves office on January 20.