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George not guilty of Dando murder ... voting down of a $700bn (Ј380bn) bill in the US aimed at bailing out Wall Street is "very disappointing".
The plan was rejected by 228 to 205 votes in the House of Representatives.
Mr Brown said he would do "whatever is necessary" to ensure the stability of the British financial system.
Tory leader David Cameron said the eyes of the world were on Congress. Nick Clegg for the Lib Dems said it heralded "a very dangerous time".
'Continued stability'
Without a bail-out plan, US banks will be left to handle all their own bad mortgage debt and more of them will be in danger of going bust.
Shares on Wall Street plunged at the news and ended down more than 700 points, the biggest daily fall ever.
Mr Brown said: "The vote in America is very disappointing. The governor of the Bank of England, the chancellor and I will take whatever action necessary to ensure continued stability for Britain.
"The stability of our system is something that we are doing everything in our power to maintain."
It came on a day when government announced it was nationalising the troubled Bradford & Bingley bank in order to safeguard its future.
"We have taken decisive action in the last few days and that decisive action has continued over the weekend," said the prime minister.
"We are doing everything to maintain the security of families and citizens in this country."
Mr Brown said he had sent a message to the White House "about the importance of taking decisive action".
'Great anxiety'
Mr Cameron, currently in Birmingham for the Conservative party conference, said that developments in the US had strong implications for the UK.
"Clearly the eyes of the world are on Congress and a deal is needed in order to stabilise financial markets not just in America but elsewhere," he said.
"What is needed is for parties to work together and there may be lessons for us back home.
"We are a responsible opposition, we stand ready to work with the government and help the government in any way that is necessary to bring stability at what is a time of great anxiety."
Mr Clegg said he was writing to the other two leaders to offer cross-party talks on the situation.
He said: "With the [Treasury Secretary Henry] Paulson package blocked in Congress we are now entering a very dangerous time.
"We must do everything to prevent the events in the US Congress leading to a downward spiral of market panic and widespread bank failure. This would pose the greatest challenge to Britain and the world in decades.
"That's why I believe these exceptional times require a suspension of normal political hostilities and a rapid move towards a cross-party consensus on how we might prepare for the worst-case scenario."
'Leave of senses'
Speaking on the BBC's Newsnight programme, EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson expressed concern at the failure to agree a bail-out deal.
"I feel they've taken leave of their senses, and I hope that in Europe, we will not see politicians and parliamentarians replicating the sort of irresponsibility and political partisanship that we have seen in Washington," he said.
The BBC's Iain Watson in Westminster says the scale of the crisis seems to be creating greater consensus rather than conflict among UK political parties.
Leading politicians are determined not to allow the financial situation to become a drama, he added.
BBC News correspondent Kevin Connolly in the US says frantic steps will now be taken to get some form of amended version of the bill through Congress.
(BBC)
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