Mnuchin said yesterday when the Dow was higher that "we are not going to close the markets." IMO he was wrong to oppose closing the damned markets. Does he want to wait until the market cap of US business is ZERO? Not only are investors and market traders completely spooked, but the damned machine trading is driving the markets lower and lower.
Close the markets now!! pl
What have we all been doing to stop this hysteria NOW!
I got myself kicked off a local blog because I kept trying to cool things down with facts, comparisons and reason. Got accused by the moderator of politicizing, spreading conspiracy theories and misinformation. Poof – I was permanently cut off. But they took my subscription money anyway.
So I tried. But the “progressive” agenda was too strong and too much in control in even our local local media. But this is California, did I expect anything else? The “party of science” does not like getting called out in fact they are the party of superstition, shamanism and scapegoating.
I’d like to see a huge rally tomorrow and then close the markets till this passes.
Right on, Colonel. This ongoing bloodbath and the machine-driven trading is a horror show.
Well, now the NY Stock Exchange won’t be using floor traders for the foreseeable future, it will all be electronic – wonder what chaos that will bring.
The problem is that the market cap of many companies IS zero, or should be. Boeing and the airlines in particular haven’t just spent most of their cash buying back shares to boost their price over the last decade, they’ve actually borrowed money to do it too! The wipe-out of the last few weeks wasn’t some black swan event, they were all bugs in search of a windshield. Many of them are going to wind up in chapter 11 either way.
The Fed should have the let the market correct back in the winter of ’18, but they inflated things even further. I would think the scale of the collapse and sense of panic means we should see a bounce here, but this is a liquidity squeeze and maybe there is even more distressed selling to be done than there is willing buying yet.
This is far larger crisis than 2008, the steps taken by governments and central banks are unprecedented, the old system has died, what comes next?
Sir
With epic bailouts in our immediate future maybe the financial markets will anticipate?
Shutting the markets would only deprive clearing of securities from weak hands to strong hands. Only those leveraged and unable to make the margin calls have to liquidate. Long term investors with capital can take advantage of better pricing.
The machines also took the market up & up when the momentum was north. Maybe we can do something about the fractional second holding period of securities.
Only equity markets or also bonds, commodities, derivatives?
Computerized trading only makes the result arrive faster.
And other factors contribute to sell offs – margin calls, portfolio managers getting out before it gets worse, short sellers.
All these transactions – executed at light speed – create churn which creates more light speed transactions.
Closing the markets would likely set off a true panic.
People need to get at their money.
There is also a significant workforce that operates the markets and they like to get paid.
UpstateNYer
Let me know what money you have left when you “capitulate” and sell.
We all Keynesians now, Sir.
jack
When your stuff is worth next to nothing, let me know.
Vegetius
I always was. People here are confusing my dislike of a pervasive regulatory and police state with something else. Jefferson was against territorial expansion until Napoleon offered to sell us the Louisiana territory. reality intrudes for people with common sense.
It’s a fire sale at this point – Yes. The markets should be closed ASAP before the damn Chinese and various oligarchs, internal and external, buy up the entire country and emerge as ultimate victors after the virus panic is lifted.
My husband’s not with me on this but I agree with you Colonel about Automated Trading likely being a culprit that’s helping to wreak havoc in the markets, but I also agree with BillWade — wait until there’s a big rally AND THEN close it down!!!
All levels of government continue to exert controls during this pandemic — why shouldn’t something be done to ease the bloodletting in the markets???
Sir
Why do you believe it will permanently be zero? That’s a serious question. Unless one needs immediate liquidity or the margin man is calling, folks can wait until this too blows over.
During the dotcom crash many tech companies were trading 80-90% below their highs. Companies like Intel, Microsoft, Oracle. That was the time to buy. Similarly in this case either the leverage is flushed out and there will be a great opportunity to acquire great companies with solid balance sheets or even more leverage will be piled on and that may pose an opportunity to acquire those companies the computers like. The high beta stocks.
I’m not worried. As a Depression era kid I’ve lived through many a turbulent period in financial markets. We seem to have an episode every decade during the last 4 decades. During the last one in 2008 there was also a pervasive sentiment that the financial world would end. It didn’t and neither did the credit excesses that led to it in the first place. More leverage was piled on. This time it doesn’t look to be any different with massive central bank balance sheet expansion and even more massive debt fueled federal government spending in the works.
I’m already deploying capital. Nibbling at energy company securities and cash generating tech companies. My plan is to buy every Monday until I get to a full position in every security I want to own. Of course financial assets are a small part of my overall portfolio where real assets are the majority.
The president hinted at something from the FDA in the works, he’ll reveal it tomorrow. If it’s good news, I expect a market rally like we’ve never seen before. If it’s so-so news, a bit of an uptick and that lukewarm pot of water I’m sitting will get just that much hotter.
jack
What is “immediate?” I let my self constructed trust plow everything back into the portfolio and have never taken money from it. It is to go to causes that would drive the communist trolls here mad. Do you really think that further massive destruction of market cap will not massively injure the economy?
Sir
By immediate I mean the next 3-6 months.
“Do you really think that further massive destruction of market cap will not massively injure the economy?”
Yes. It will because we’ve financialized the economy so massively. However, those companies that are not leveraged and have a real business would only be temporarily impacted. The real issue IMO is the massive inflation of credit that preceded it. We’ve done the same thing in each of these cycles. We never allow the bad credit and malinvestment to clear. We keep papering over the destruction of real capital by adding even more debt. This time once again just like 2008 and 2000 before we’re gonna see the federal government borrow massively and the federal reserve monetize also massively. If we’re a capitalist society then we should allow for Schumpetrian creative destruction. By constantly keeping alive those businesses well past their sell date we perpetuate the failures. Occasionally we need to clear the deadwood.
The turmoil we’re seeing in financial markets is the unwinding of speculative leverage and a dearth of liquidity. On the way up when animal spirits are rising and credit is plentiful massive leveraged financial structures are created and those who take the riskiest bets are rewarded on Wall St. Since the Grrenspan era anyway, it has become a truism that if you’ve become massively big in the scale of your leveraged speculation you’re likely to have your losses socialized. Walter Bagehot wrote in his work Lombard St in the late 1800s – in a panic lend freely to those solvent at high interest backed by sound collateral. Key words are solvency and sound collateral. The problem with our contemporary world of speculative finance is the very, very thin sliver of equity on a massively leveraged credit structure driven on the notion of moneyness of speculative instruments. One of the consequences is that corporate America has changed its management incentive structure from long term financial performance when I was a young man to short term performance of the stock.
IMO, speculative finance is in the catbirds seat. They drive the agenda. Until the last balance sheet is fully levered, they’ll keep driving us off the cliff.
The appropriate response IMO is to hold to account those who aided and abetted the gigantic credit inflation after the 2008 financial crisis. We’ve got to say no more hair of the dog that bit us. We need to stop solving debt problems with more debt.
I listened to Bill Ackman’s CNBC interview today that supposedly
further tanked the market. It’s posted all over the net…Ackman
wants the U.S. to close down as many businesses as possible now fora minimum of 30 days, in other words a really tight curfew across the board. I understand his reasoning, ie. better to take the bitter pill now than drag it out for a year or more & lose it all.
I’m guessing if the markets completely also shut down the short bidders would go into total meltdown. What would G Soros do?
Supposedly gun/ammo sales are rising which signals total fear.
Guess many are afraid someone will take their toilet paper, etc,@ the barrel of a gun. These are interesting times. Guess my
immediate concern is around the supply chain of pharma coming out
of China…like Jack I admit to a few nibbles (XOM & PFE), in
retrospect I nibbled way too soon but love dividends…if the Saudis & Russians don’t slow down their drilling it’ll be money
for nothin’ & oil for free….the green energy folks are making
their move & that’s ok with me
elaine
What is in prospect if this continues is a total melt down of the US economy and a possible civil war. If you want that be happy with sophistic BS.
jack
If you want to live n Cloud Cuckoo Land rather than what is right in front of your face, good for you. Please leave your money invested in equities while looking for the bottom.
Close the markets now!!
Col. Lang,
I am surprised coming from you. I always understood you as a libertarian leaning original constitutionalist.
Isn’t greed and fear part and parcel of markets largely driven by human emotions? It says something about our human psychology that throughout the epochs there has been this fervent belief that when my assets went up it was because of my skill but when it declines it was beyond my control.
I wonder how many investors found it strange that the over past several years the Swiss National Bank conjured new Swiss Francs with the click of a keyboard, converted them into USD in the forex market and then bought Apple stock. What is the real price of Apple stock?
Is it de rigueur now in nominally capitalist societies that partial nationalization of private companies by central banks is to be cheered because the stock price went up?
Upstate NYer,
In all honesty, we could pay the significant workforce that operates the markets enough money to just sit home and pay all their bills and meet all their needs while we take the markets offline for just long enough for all of society to really know how bad AND NO WORSE the epidemic will get and be able to factor in the reality of it.
When the fear-level is down enough for all the market workforce people and the big money players to make analytical decisions about what stuff is worth, then we can bring the markets online again.
When a tolerable level of stability is restored then we can think about longer range things and stuff according to our respective ideologies.
Closing the markets won’t make any difference, they will just carry on the same when they open again because the virus is being used as a cover story for why this is happening. Banks that have gone broke aren’t left to thier fate, there’s your problem.
The stock markets were artificially high because of the stock buybacks done by companies thus boosting the stock prices. $4.5 trillion was used for this and before 1982 this was illegal!
https://wolfstreet.com/2020/03/17/after-blowing-4-5-trillion-on-share-buybacks-corporate-america-airlines-boeing-other-culprits-want-taxpayer-fed-bailouts-for-these-shareholders/
Another factor that the volatility (VIX) was kept artifically low. Everytime there was movement the central banks pumped money in the system. It has been extremely low at about 10 for a long time.
Low volatily creates a sense of false security but in reality the surpressed volatility is a time bomb waiting to explode. Since September 2019 the Fed was pumping trillions of liquidity in the repo-market (overnight lending) because the traditional lenders don’t trust the borrowers (in paying back) The explosion of volatility happened during the last weeks rising to higher levels than 2008.
IMO low volatility, stock buybacks and Modern Monetary Theory (which is keeping the money-printing presses running by the Central Banks) have created a Ponzi scheme that is now deflating to normal levels. The market is always right and creative destruction is part of the capitalist system.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_Monetary_Theory
And how are you going to close the markets ?
Close the US markets, and traders will sell elsewhere. Cant sell the spoos ? Short the DAX/FTSE – whatever – it does not matter – this thing is a global riskoff in a scramble for USD. And as soon as you open the US markets you will just lock limit down until the US indicies catch up with the rest of the world. Your shutdown just did nothing.
Unless you shut down ALL markets, it will not work.
Putting a incremental transaction tax increase on trading, when holding a stock less than 1 year, 3 month, 1 month, 1 week and 1 day would benefit the long term investors and weed out the speculators. Similar transaction tax scenario should be considered for foreign exchanges. The tax money can be used to fund the fight against ALL TYPES of emergencies in the future, including healthcare, bank bailouts, defense emergencies …
Also, Adam Smith needs to be revived instead of speculator crony/corona (sic) capitalism
Some market guru made an incisive comment a couple weeks ago and I paraphrase: this is not a “buy the dip market”, this is a “don’t try to catch a falling knife market.”
LondonBob — Even someone as unsophisticated as I knew that the bubble was going to burst, big, at some point. The market was at or near a peak on Dec 31, the basis date for USA retirees to calculate Required Minimum Distribution (RMD) for the following year.
We’re in a situation where RMD based on Dec 31 2019 is going to be a far greater proportion of the amount — if any — remaining in retirement account.
Now, that’s going from one pot with my name on it to another pot with my name on it, but in the middle, IRS takes at least 15%.
—
Col Lang — Yes, the equity market meltdown is a major problem. But shutting down small businesses for an uncertain time — I think that’s at least equally ruinous.
One more thought — years and years ago the Shaker Heights Public Library had a bookmark that said, “We can get thru a time with books and no money better than a time with money and no books.”
Closing the libraries has been devastating.
Colonel – I don’t know about the States but the damage all this will do in Europe is great. The vivid phrases used by your contributors – “bugs in search of a windshield” or “This is a far larger crisis than 2008, the steps taken by governments and central banks are unprecedented, the old system has died, what comes next?” are no more than sober truth when it comes to Europe.
I may be a day behind the fair on this, but I don’t see in Europe the sense of urgency in dealing with this crisis that I see in the States. Whether the Fed and the Government have the firepower to stabilise the markets, whether the means you suggest for calming them can be effected, isn’t something one can guess at. But at least there’s a sense they’re having a go!
I don’t think the ECB, nor yet HMG in the UK, really know what’s hit them yet. Fiddling around on the margins isn’t going to work this time round and inevitably that will backfire on the States, however well or ill the situation is being handled there.
On the virus itself, I don’t think that even now we’re handling it right. The institutional dysfunction that has characterised us in England for so long is now being paid for. I’ve linked to a UK expert before here and with your permission will do so again; we’re really in no shape to get on top of the crisis even were we to know how to do it –
http://www.eureferendum.com/blogview.aspx?blogno=87551#disqus_thread
All reminds me of Solzhenitsyn’s imaginative reconstruction of the Russian Army stuck in the Masurian swamps in WW1. The men were there, that army was still in reasonable shape, but with a dud HQ they were screwed.
So Trump will get to be a wartime president after all – and without having to start a war.
Spring in this hemishpere is upon us. The sun still rises, rain still falls and the crops still grow. The farmers and other folk who keep the real economy going and for whom Mini Mike reserves such disdain, will ensure everyone still get fed. A great reappraisal of our priorities is upon us and I believe it will be cathartic for America and the World in general.
Jack,
Where is all that margin investment you keep bringing up coming from, it isn’t 401ks, IRAs, or pension funds doing that; it is also not many individual investors. We should “… allow for some Shumpetrian creative destruction.”
That worked out really well for the folks in what is now the Russian Federation. As a self described “depression era kid ” you won’t be around long to live with the results.
blue peacock
Capitalism like free trade should not be a suicide pact among believers.
The issue is not the drop in the Dow, but the US dollar and its role in the international system. Triffin’s dilemma is here, and any “remedies” will further undermine the dollar and its reserve status. The end of the US dollar as the reserve currency will come a lot sooner than most people realize.
The calamity we will be facing was IMO understood by the financiers…hence, the LCTM, Dotcom, Housing crises. Permitted by the willful blindness of the Federal Reserve, the knowledgeable financiers for the past two decades have siphoned off/cashed in on the wealth of our real economy. The repeal of Glass Steagall formally sanctioned the looting and let loose the dogs. Shutting down the markets now will do nothing but intensify the “correction”/siphoning.
Colonel:
The last thing I would do is sell.
I survived 2009 without breathing hard.
I have a multi-layered construct of income;if one goes down, I reach back to another layer.
I am able to life comfortably – no outrageous spending
My balance sheet will come back.
I don’t day trade.
Majority of day traders LOSE money YoY.
I would be interested to know how long you would all expect the markets to be shut. I am no economist but if they are shut and then reopened at some point while the situation is no better than today then I would have thought those who could not sell would take the opportunity causing a crash requiring the market to re close. If you wait for obvious signs that the worst is over that could take in excess of a year.
When I have seen C-span footage of Congressional or Senate proceedings the average age seem to put most of them in to the high risk category, likewise for the Senior members of the Judicial branch, cabinet secretaries etc. Given the very high fatality rate in these age groups what effect is that likely to have on governance once we do return to a semblance of normality.
upstateNYer
I built my position in the same way and am in the same situation.
JJackson
We had elaborate preparations for something like that during the Cold War and can return what we call “Continuity of Governance” methods. Senator Portman of Ohio proposed that this AM. Essentially we are discussing running the government from a dispersed deployment.
JJackson I would keep the securities markets closed until the panic passes. I think that will happen soon because of quick development of therapies using existing combinations of drugs.
Col. Lang
I agree that ideological utopias don’t exist and there is no pure expression of either capitalism or communism. Cronyism among the elites exists in both systems.
The larger question here is about socialization of private sector speculative losses. When is it appropriate and who benefits?
In the 2008 financial crisis, the decision was to make the managements, shareholders and creditors of Wall St whole and foreclose individual homeowners. The Bush/Obama administrations and both parties in Congress picked winners and losers.
Why is it that all these extraordinary calls for socialization occur only when speculations go awry and not when government and central bank aided credit-fueled speculations are let loose? Are we essentially arguing that we want a one-way street where financial assets only go up?
I have not seen any criticism among the Wall St cognoscenti as central banks “printed money” to acquire debt and equity stakes in private enterprises ostensibly to increase the share price and to prevent a reckoning for the private creditors and shareholders. What is the logical outcome of such policies? How far should that be taken? Are we going to “nationalize” all insolvent enterprises whose managements are large donors to political campaigns? What about the cornerstone owner? Does he not get a bailout too?
Market cap destruction has no long term deleterious impact on sound businesses. In the 2000 market selloff in technology and telecom, companies like cisco, Microsoft, Adobe and others saw their market cap decline by nearly 90%, yet as businesses they thrived. Growing their sales, profits and headcount after the artificial excess demand for their products evaporated. Yes, many cash burning start-ups did die. But many new companies with sounder business models like Google were also created.
This is not about ideology but about what should the policies be. What are folks arguing for and why? Since LTCM the implicit policy has been that speculative finance can keep their speculative gains but their losses must be socialized.
They need to close the markets, keep the inflation target of 2%, and print as much money as is required to keep the same level of employment (and crime) as was in place on February 24 until this Virus is under control.
Once the Virus is under control, or we have a vaccine, then they can start opening the markets again.
The debt that was issued during this time, with 0% interest, backed by the people (not the Fed), can be waived.
There is no other solution.
Fred
Many Americans have neither 401K nor pension assets. They don’t really care if the stock market goes up or down as they have no stake. They do care however that the small business they work for and earn a hand to mouth existence is shutdown through an own goal by our government.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wealth_inequality_in_the_United_States
I get it many are for socialism for Wall St and managements of the S&P 500 companies and their stock portfolio in their 401k. Of course it’s all for our good.
You know that Schumpetrian creative destruction is a fact of life among small business entrepreneurs who don’t have access to the government trough when they go belly up. The collapse of the Soviet Union is analogous?
“I think that will happen soon because of quick development of therapies using existing combinations of drugs.”
I agree. There is already very promising news of the effectiveness of chloroquine, for example.
My very large bank is limiting the amount of cash withdrawals. And the bills are brand new. Did Mnuchin have pallets of paper currency printed up just as was done in US foreign wars?
Is the currency going to be rendered worthless when the PTB so decide?
Colonel, I assure you I’m not happy about any of this however don’t
think anything can ever totally stop business. If things proceed
in their present state a real depression could be @ hand.
I don’t feel safe even holding tangible assets like land as last year I received a 300% property tax increase so no asset is safe.
Safety is an illusion on all fronts @ all times IMHO. “Safety” is a
fantasy we employ in our minds to get us from point A to point B;
it’s a physiological defense mechanism
James
It seems you are slow on the uptake. I don’t want anything from you on SST at all. this is the last post or comment from you that I will allow. If someone else approves something from you I will delete it.
My understanding is that equity markets can drop without causing lasting damage and recover, e.g. the internet bust. Corrections happen after long up periods, virus or not. The real risk is in the much larger credit markets. The fed will be rolling out additional programs such as being the buyer of last resort for commercial paper just like post Lehman to keep credit flowing.
Not a pundit but i can foresee a market holiday to stop a self reinforcing panic. A natural progression from the intra-day circuit breakers in place now.
Call this the Greta Thunberg virus. It is delivering everything she asked for. Zero carbon emissions. Expect global cooling to start tomorrow.
(Yeah, I stole this moniker from someone else on line, but how appropriate. )
Socal Rhino
“Not a pundit but i can foresee a market holiday to stop a self reinforcing panic.” Glad we agree.
Why italy? Prestogiacomo makes some very good point – 5 things you should know about Italy.
Most curiously, the only EU country to get on board with OBOR -One Belt One Road – with China getting access to Italian ports once they move goods out of Western China via Pakistan and the KKH to the port of Karachi – actually a new port constructed near Karachi for the OBOR. Chinese wanted to spare no expense to make the KKH linking their countries an all weather highway.
.
Mestre, Trieste, and Genoa major Italian commercial ports in Northern Italy. Naples and Bari-Brindisi in Southern Italy not so much. Thus enters Greta Thunberg’s corona virus with a vengeance to Italy? Plus their high illegal immigration impacts coming in bu boat from the Mediterranean.
https://www.ocregister.com/2020/03/18/southern-california-cities-sound-alarm-over-coming-financial-hit-from-coronavirus/
Jack,
You did not answer my question about where all the margin positions are coming from but answered with more inuendo and anti-Americanism.
“You know that Schumpetrian creative destruction is a fact of life among small business entrepreneurs who don’t have access to the government trough when they go belly up. The collapse of the Soviet Union is analogous?”
The “creative destruction” Schumpeter was calling for is not a fact of life for small business entrepreneurs at all – risk is. The main risk right now is government. Please see the governments in California and other states creatively destroying an almost $1,000,000 industry:
https://www.restaurant.org/research/restaurant-statistics/restaurant-industry-facts-at-a-glance
The collapse of the USSR is analougous to what is happening to the US economy right now and it is going to much of the private ownership of businesses in the US and shift to foreign control much of the larger publicly traded companies. All with the aid of the anti-Trump left.
GovernorComrade Newsome in California is, as of this writing, about to shut down even more of the US economy.https://abc7.com/6022634/
That provides a great incentive to initiate the economic proposals of the Green New Deal, which is all about transforming the capitalist economy of the US. I’m sure it will all be run for our own interests, as determined by the career professionals of the left. Would anyone like to bet on how far the Dow falls Friday?
A Reuters report on hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) availability in the US. Some reports have suggested HCQ is effective in mitigating the symptoms of the virus:
The Dutch are developing an aerosol delivery HCQ treatment which is reportedly even more effective than HCQ in oral from (in Dutch). A chink of light from the approaching dawn?
https://www.rtvnoord.nl/nieuws/220259/RUG-onderzoekt-effect-malariamedicijn-op-corona
Colonel,
Seems that a few Members of Congress may have used their positions for ‘insider trading’ dumping their stocks and preventing a massive ding in their personal pocketbooks. Sen. Burr head of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Sen. Loeffler, Sen. Feinstein, etc..
There are calls now for their resignations and prosecutions claiming they committed insider trading.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jackkelly/2020/03/20/senators-accused-of-insider-trading-dumping-stocks-after-coronavirus-briefings/#7c5168bf4a45
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/finance/other/us-senators-accused-of-coronavirus-insider-trading-are-a-symbol-of-moral-bankruptcy/ar-BB11vuPF
Deap,
I am just an amateur science buff, but I don’t think that an extended corona recession or corona depression would start any global cooling.
First off, before anything else, I would prefer to not even have a corona recession or a corona depression. The scientific data and understanding gained would not be worth the social, personal, human and economic loss. If we are going to hope for an “accidental experiment” that clarifies the year-to-year workings of climate and helps separate the correct predictors from the incorrect ones, I would prefer it to come in the form of 2-3 years of measurable increase in solar light output, or 2-3 years of measurable decrease in solar light output, or 2-3 years of successive Mt. Pinatubo-type sulfur-rich eruptions to keep the earth in partial shade from incoming sunlight, or some other such accidental experiment.
All that being said, I guess we are going to get a corona recession. I hope it is just a REE-cession and not a DEE-pression. And that it lasts for 6 months or less.
But it will do what it does. And so if it lasts for two years what will happen with weather and climate? I think there will not be any general whole-earth-surface-on-average cooling. The reason I think that is because the global greenhouse gases which have been recently released will stay in the atmosphere from between quite a few years ( nitrogen oxides, methane) to many years ( carbon dioxide). Whereas the particulate pollution will more rapidly settle out back down to the surface. So once all the micro-particles have settled out and if they are not replaced with fresh ones over the next two years, the amount of sunlight getting through to the surface will be increased by 2 or so percent due to the sudden lack of micro-particle shading.
This 2 or so percent increase in unshaded incoming sunlight will eventually break down into 2 or so percent more heat. The remaining-in-place higher loads of greenhouse gases will partially impede the re-radiation of certain infra-red wavelengths back into space. The heat which can’t escape via infra-red re-radiation into space will manifest as greater heat buildup at the surface. Some of it will play out in bigger better storms and storm systems here and there, some in bigger better heat waves. A lot will go into melting the Arctic ice faster and some will go into melting the edges of the Antarctic ice faster. And some will go into a faster meltdown and thaw-out of the permafrost.
If the corona slowdown lasts for two years, then I think that by 18 months from now, we will be seeing these expressions of faster heat retention and buildup. If that is what happens, I will feel vindicated in my understanding of current climate processes. If that does NOT happen under such an economic scenario, then I will have to think about why. If everything else remains equal . . . no solar output reduction, no Pinatubo volcanoes, no world-scale forest fires big enough to restore the missing earth-shading micro-particles . . . and still no warming in 1.5 to 2 years, then I will start rethinking my understanding of climate change theory.
If the new coronavid !9 virus doesn’t kill me first.