It’s now clear that the Great Recession is not (was not) the Great Depression 2.0. A deeper crisis appears to have been averted. That’s not to say that all’s well. But given the dire expectations of late-2008 and early 2009, the view from early April 2010 looks like a gift from heaven. The question is whether this is a free lunch? Or, as we expect, there’s a price to pay, even if the price isn’t obvious yet, in either the details or magnitude.
Of course, we know that there’ll be lots of debt to deal with. We’ve known that for some time. But it seems as though the market, so far, has accepted this price. In fact, the market doesn’t appear extraordinarily upset, to the extent that we can glean such sentiments from things like bond prices and the associated yields.