If they did, reading financial headlines, particularly in the US, Greece and China over the past few days would have left them feeling like they had just tripped over a black cat sleeping under a ladder on Friday the 13th.
On Wednesday, the NYSE suspended trading for three and a half hours because of a technical glitch, the Wall Street Journal’s website also fell over around that time and United Airlines’ fleet was grounded for technical reasons.
This, after investors there had woken up to news that, as many as 45% of Chinese stocks were suspended, despite significant intervention by Chinese authorities, would have left many wondering just what they were doing even dipping their toes into the markets. And, that is without even mentioning the ongoing chaos in Greece.
Come Thursday, however, and Chinese markets were up as sharply as market intervention finally began to slow the slump, and US stocks opened higher with NYSE trading normally.
Indeed, given the uncertainty that remains about Greece’s future within the Eurozone, and questions over whether or not there is more yet to be squeezed out of the Chinese equity bubble and, more importantly, whether or not it has longer term ramifications for Chinese growth, market optimism remains rather high.
Which begs the question, why?
The answer to this question, we would hazard to guess lies at the feet of central bankers who have increasingly come to be relied upon by markets to bail the world out of whatever crisis is currently ongoing.
