Interesting Article...
Global Stock Gains Show Fed `Stepped Up' to Avert Credit Crisis
By Michael Tsang
Aug. 25 (Bloomberg) -- Stock markets around the world are rallying in the wake of the Federal Reserve's decision to cut its lending rate to banks to help avert a credit crisis.
``Clearly the Fed stepped up,'' said Jeffrey Kleintop, who helps oversee more than $173 billion as chief market strategist at LPL Financial Services in Boston. With the discount rate cut, the Fed ``told the markets they're not going to let this liquidity crisis become a major contagion.''
The central bank on Aug. 17 cut the interest rate it charges banks by 0.5 percentage point to 5.75 percent, acknowledging for the first time a policy shift was needed to contain the subprime- mortgage collapse that roiled financial markets and wiped out $5.56 trillion in global market value in less than a month.
The decision helped ignite a rally in global equities. The Morgan Stanley Capital International World Index of 23 developed markets has since rebounded 5.4 percent, after plummeting 11 percent from its record on July 19.
In the U.S., the Standard & Poor's 500 Index climbed 4.8 percent, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average advanced 4.2 percent. The Dow Jones Stoxx 600 Index of European companies rose 5.2 percent. The MSCI Asia-Pacific Index jumped 8.1 percent, the biggest weekly advance since March 2002.
Emerging markets rallied the most after suffering the biggest losses during the global rout. The MSCI Emerging Markets Index climbed 8.7 percent since the discount rate cut, after plummeting 18 percent from a record on July 23.
VIX Tumbles
The advance in stocks accompanied a rise in yields of the safest U.S. government securities as investors waded back into riskier assets. Three-month Treasury bill yields increased for a fourth day yesterday to 4.21 percent, after touching a two-year low of 2.505 percent on Aug. 20.
On that day, bill yields tumbled by the most since 1987.
The main measure of U.S. stock volatility also declined as stock markets regained their footing. The Chicago Board Options Exchange Volatility Index, known as the VIX, fell 31 percent to 20.72 this week. The drop was the biggest since the CBOE started calculating the index in 1990. Lower readings indicating traders expect smaller share-price swings in the next 30 days.
The Fed's decision bolstered speculation that the central bank will lower its benchmark target lending rate on overnight loans between banks at or before its next meeting on Sept. 18. Goldman Sachs & Co. predicted that the federal funds target rate will fall to 4.75 percent this year.
Interest-rate futures show a 58 percent chance that Fed will lower its overnight lending rate between banks to 5 percent by its Sept. 18 meeting. Forty-two percent are betting on a cut to 4.75 percent by then.
I am not sure if I am buying the idea that we are out of the woods yet, but it does seem to me that the Feds response was a measured step that calmed things down...at least temporarily. Now, if they don't cut at their next meeting...look out.