I found one thing "interesting" that Mr. Bernanke said today...that the squabbling by the U.S. politicians over the debt ceiling issue caused the financial turmoil this summer in the markets. To this, I would respectfully point out that the financial markets never fully recovered from their falls from 2007 and some from their peak in 2000...in spite of both massive monetary stimulus packages that have been implemented by the Fed in 2009 and 2010.
The
Monthly charts below of
GS, C, XLF & JPM confirm this.
I think I can safely say that volatility is here to stay in the markets, at least until next year's elections are over and the dust has settled into 2013, since the likelihood of the politicians reaching a fiscal agreement on how to fix the economy before then is probably nil. Tie that into the global economic and fiscal turmoil, and that adds up to volatility, in my books.
