Your credibility around the world his hovering at historical low levels (like the Nasd.),at least in two fields:moral/culture and finance/economics. Please tell me in what ways the European finance/economics is superior to that of the Americans? Europe is a second-rate economy in virtually every aspect compared to the US, and the gap gets larger every day. Apparently you don't follow financial and economic data, because only a fool would actually believe that Europe has shown any type of superior performance in this regard.
Very pleased to explain you. As a stock trader (just for hobby,not for work) with a +13% result this year, obviously I follow finance/economic news and analysis everysday. Well, I can start citing the enronite/worldcomite. This mean, greed and dishonesty from top executives, coupled with a too loose financing system that let excessive leveraging. I hope you can accept the fact that US corporations are much more leveraged that Europeans. Else I can find you a lot of data. Tha same is for consumer spen ding: the practice of monetizing virtual plusvalences from increases in house pricing it's typical American - and typical foolish, since house prices can fluctuate alot. Second , the myth of American productivity: it's true that American workers are more productive that any others (except the Luxembougese), but that's because they work more hours: the productivity-per-hour is not inferior in Europe (for exapmle the productivityper-hour in Belgium is higher). Third , p/e ratios: actually around 22 in the US, 16 in Europe, for the 2002 earnings (I feel that my actual portfolio since it's made of established and higly undervalued stocks of Europeans companies with p/e ratios between 5 and 8 on 2002 earnings,before the recent rally:I didn't find any with such requirements on the NYSE,if anybody find some please tell me. Conclusion:the US stock market is still overvalued, despite it performed 10th of 19 among the world biggest stock markets in 2002: see the for detailed statistics. Fourth the unsanable trade deficit:the US feel rich because tha rest of the world let them consume (much) more than what they produce: the aggrassive militar policy is driven by fear of losing credibility and autorithy abroad.
These are few reasons.