[MeneMeneTekelUpharsin]

It is becoming obvious that stock and securities prices are completely false, invented, or at least totally manipulated . Talk about uncertainty...we have more uncertainty over more issues than ever before and are often told that the markets do not like uncertainty, but suddenly the markets love uncertainty. The corruption behind the markets mirrors the corruption everywhere else. Maybe Jackie Chan was right....

[DuncanWaring]

The financial markets have been a rigged casino for at least the last four years, maybe longer.

[9YearLurker]

There can be much uncertainty—but less than a few weeks ago. Also, currency uncertainty can lead to equities being a partial hedge against inflation.

[2001convSVT]

Rigged stock markets and crony capitalism go hand in had. We haven’t had a truly free market in, I don’t know how long.

[foreverfree]

Maybe Jackie Chan was right....

Care to explain?

ff

[proxy_user]

Well, if you have a lot of money to invest, what do you propose? Are you going to buy 10-year treasuries that pay 1.5%?

[cuban leaf]

Markets are not up. The dollar is down.

Seriously.

[jdsteel]

Your description of the market as “up” is curious. We've been range-bound for a long time. It is higher than it was DURING the crash of 4-5 years ago, but lower than the all time highs. With real inflation much higher than the official number equities have not been looking odd at all. The market actually reflects our sub-par recovery and tepid outlook pretty well.

[lwd]

QE3 (or whatever # we are on now) was announced a month ago with the intentions of dumping money into the stock market. Before that they were buying up junk mortgages. I think a lot of the recent gains are from the fed pumping in money. So...yeah....”total manipulation” but people are making money so no one will complain.

[SampleMan]

The weakening of the dollar's value makes U.S. stocks cheaper to foreign investment, yet higher in dollars.

For example, if $2 only buys what $1 did 5 years ago, then it can be assumed that stock prices would double, if the underlying value of the stock only remained the same.

The German stock market went through the roof during the Weimar inflation.