The Market – An Interview

We are always hearing about “The Market” as if it had an independent identity.  Analysts are constantly talking about how “The Market hates uncertainty” or “’The Market’ is making a correction,” and you know, other shit like that. The problem is that we never hear from “The Market” itself.  I wanted to correct that.  

So, I did a little digging and I was able to finally hook up with The Market at its island retreat at a location that it would prefer not to publicize. As I approached its vast estate in the limo that it had sent for me, I was greeted by a bevy of The Market’s Assistants who led me to a cottage on the property. I was later told that the Assistants were all former hedge fund managers who had defied The Market and who had then been relegated to servant positions.

The cottage was dark.  The only slight ray of light came from a barely cracked window right behind where The Market was sitting.  As much as I would like to give you a thorough description of what The Market looks like, I just couldn’t make out enough detail through the shadow to be able to do that.  My apologies. Anyway, I did have a good half an hour with him. 

Me: Thank you, Mr. Market, for giving me this time with you.

Market:  Please, just call me “Mark.”

Me: Well, then, Mark, as you know, we are in the midst of some awful times – pandemics and racial tensions and wars. Please tell me what you think about what is going on in the world right now?

Market:  Oh, I couldn’t care less.  Let me correct that just a bit.  I could care a little less. I care only about what other people think I care about.

Me:  Let me be more specific.  What about pandemics?

Market:  Ah. We’ve had them before. Money doesn’t get sick. Stock prices sometimes go up and sometimes go down while the virus marches on.  All that matters is what people buy and what they sell.  The airbags on cable and the blowhards with the tip sheets control all that.

Me: But, doesn’t the virus have something to do with it? 

Market: Only if the talking heads say so.

Me: How about racial tensions?

Market: How about ‘em?” As if people haven’t made money before when there were racial tensions. Hell, when weren’t there racial tensions? What was that thing called? Oh, yeah, the Civil War. Do you know that if you had bought stock in industrial and manufacturing businesses on the eve of the Civil War, your family would be as rich as shit today. A $100 investment in American Cotton Oil then, after all the mergers and acquisitions – and I love that stuff, by the way – would have given your descendants over 6 million shares of Unilever and they’d be cashing in over $10,000,000 in dividends a year. It’s all a gamble.  I’m the biggest casino operator on Earth. Does a roulette wheel care about race relations?

Me: Well, what about wars?

Market: Hah! Do I really have to answer that?  How many wars have there been?  And wars are usually good for me. People think that war industries are good investments. 

Me: Don’t you feel any moral obligation to be on the side of good public policy?

Market: Who do you think you’re talkin’ to? My name’s “Mark,” but not “St. Mark.” All I am is a place for people to make money, and they can do that any way they want. Not my fault if Americans want the foundational institution of their economy to be amoral.

Me: Our time is almost up, Mark.  Is there anything else you want to say?

Market: No. I’ll let all the so-called “experts” talk for me. They always do. They get people to rely on what they say; and what they say is impossible to know, but then, just by saying it, they create the reality that they make up. It’s the perfect gig. It’s like if in sports, teams had a better chance of actually winning just because the experts picked them to. The best gig going.

Me: Well, I guess I should say, “thank you”.

But, The Market was already up and gone.