* FTSEurofirst 300 falls 0.7 pct, resumes slide
* Financial transaction tax project hits exchanges
* Bank index flirts with key support level
* For up-to-the-minute market news, click on
By Blaise Robinson
PARIS, Aug 17 (Reuters) - European stocks fell early on Wednesday, resuming their recent slide, as a meeting between German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy failed to calm worries over the euro zone debt crisis.
At 0830 GMT, the FTSEurofirst 300 index of top European shares was down 0.7 percent at 961.86 points.
The euro zone's blue-chip Euro STOXX 50 index was down 0.8 percent at 2,305.85 points.
France and Germany unveiled a plan for closer euro zone integration, but stopped short of raising the region's rescue fund and rejected for now the idea of a common eurozone bond.
"There weren't any scoops as the proposals had been mentioned over the past few days. Overall, the outcome of the meeting wasn't convincing, with no euro bond project," said Patrice Perois, trader at Kepler Capital Markets in Paris.
Deutsche Boerse
"A European Tobin-like tax is not the solution. Again, European leaders fail to provide a proper answer to the right question," Natixis strategists said.
"The efficiency of such a tax is clearly not proved. Sweden tried to use it during the second part of the 80's with a 1 percent tax on financial transactions, which doubled one year later. The results were mixed, with a move to London of almost half of the equity trades by 1990, and the tax was abandoned one year later as the loss in terms of business almost offset the gains," they wrote in a note.
Banking stocks featured among the top losers, with BNP
Paribas down 1.6 percent and Deutsche Bank
PUNISHING, REWARDING
The STOXX banking index , which has plummeted 42 percent since a peak in mid-February, was down 1.5 percent at 147.08 points, falling towards a key support level at 145.82 points, which represents the 23.6 percent Fibonacci retracement of the index's slump from July 22 to Aug. 11.
Breaking below the support could send the battered index falling back to 2-1/2 year lows hit last week.
Around Europe, the UK's FTSE 100 index was down 1 percent, Germany's DAX index down 1.3 percent, and France's CAC 40 down 0.4 percent.
Recent volatile markets and the lack of visibility on the
economic outlook have resulted in investors heavily punishing
companies that report poor earnings or a weak outlook, such as
Carlsberg
On the other hand, investors have been strongly rewarding companies that have managed to beat expectations, with shares of Danish wind turbine maker Vestas surging 18 percent on Wednesday. (Reporting by Blaise Robinson; additional reporting by Dominic Lau in London; Editing by Will Waterman)
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