The question we appear to be getting answered this week is, as Grant's Interest Rate Observer's [3] Jim Grant so poetically explains, "how much of this paper moon market is real, and how much is governmental whipped cream?" In this brief but, as usual, perfectly to the point interview with Reason.com's Matt Welch [4], Grant asks (and answers), "are prices meant to be imposed from on high, or discovered by individuals acting spontaneously in markets?" noting that, while many readers here may know the answer, "they’re regrettably in the minority." The always entertaining Grant then goes on to discuss the underlying causes of the recent market turbulence, why we don’t really "have interest rates anymore."
"One thing to recall is that markets are meant to be two-way propositions - they go up, they go down - but it has been almost four years since we have seen a 10% correction... what's unusual is not the occasional down day but The Great Sedation that preceded."
"Confoundingly to me, people have come to be quite accepting of the value attached by fiat to these pieces of paper we call currency."
Well worth the price of admission during a week when financial markets start to show their true colors...
