The Stock Market "Crash": A blog round-up

by Justin Raimondo

It's the Chinese Year of the Boar, not very propitious if you're looking to have an easy time of it. Chinese astrologer Raymond Lo predicts:

"The Year of the Boar will not be very peaceful. Boar years can be turbulent because they are dominated by fire and water, conflicting elements that tend to cause havoc."

China's booming stock market – a monument to the victory of China's "capitalist-roaders" over the last remnants of Maoism – doubled last year, and the speculators were drawn to it like … well, like this, or this. The Shanghai Exchange was about due for a big correction when it dropped by 9 percent the other day, an event which many blame for the 500 point drop in the Dow Jones – and the advent of what seems like a new era of economic turmoil, as the slide continues into Thursday. Which raises the whole question of – why now?

Fact is, there's nothing to write anymore. I mean, the economy's going to die next week. Stock market's going to crash on someone's ass on Monday and everyone in Putrajaya is going to commit harakiri on Tuesday. IF they have any shred of honour left in them.

"Clearly, there is a bull in the barn when it comes to US bond markets and that was evident long before we had a big down day in the Shanghai stock market this week. Lets hope that unlike the Madonna inspired movie "Shanghai surprise" it does not bomb totally. Why the Chinese stock market should all of a sudden be the worlds leading index of stock market performance is a mystery to me, but it is important to point out that many of these emerging market equity indices are in bubbles and will retrace and consolidate sooner or later.

After a week like this, I am more convinced than ever that the stock market is the modern era's single greatest pagan religion. Or superstition. Or both. The people who work and trade on it are supposed to be among our most sophisticated quantitative and analytical minds, yet they react to dips in earnings and blips in projections and hiccups in foreign lands like Chicken Little reacts a couple of acorns hitting him on the head. They run and scream and hide and cry and sell, sell, sell, prostrating themselves before the gods and the big board while flagellating themselves and their clients and their oh-so-fragile economy. After the Dow fell 400 points on Tuesday, I half-expected the ringing of the opening bell on Wednesday to be followed by the bringing-in of fire, the hanging of many garlic cloves, and the sacrifice of a virgin trader.