Sometimes It's Just a Black Duck

Death Crosses, the Hindenburg Omen, the Black Swan of all Black Swans, the AIDS Doji, the Devil’s Ladder, the Europocalypse, the plagues of pestilence and locusts, the Tony Robbins Alert, the Hitler Harami formation, etc.

Here a Swan, there a Swan, everywhere a Black Swan.

Except 18 months since the bottom of the market and 13 months since the NBER-recognized economic trough, none of these “Prophecies have been fulfilled”.  Sleeping Beauty hasn’t pricked her finger on the spindle and that cabin in Upstate New York I stocked with guns and SpaghettiO’s lies empty still.

The trouble with the Recency Effect is that everyone all of a sudden thought they were Nassim Taleb, orinthological experts on the spotting of Black Swans.  Every blip on the screen or blurb in the newspaper was fresh evidence of the next hundred years’ storm.  Forget being fooled by randomness, people have become obsessed with randomness.

But as we’ve learned, not every aberration is a Black Swan in the making.  Sometimes, it’s just an ordinary Black Duck.  A negative event or possibility that is processed and dealt with, that doesn’t necessarily lead to contagion, panic and meltdown.

This is not to say that warning signs of future crises should be dismissed out of hand.  In fact, my argument is the opposite; the more we learn not to get hysterical over every Black Duck, the better the chances are that when the real things comes along, we will be cogent enough in our reaction to them.

Iranian nukes and the Straight of Hormuz, Al-Quaeda’s next terrorism attempts, the Pension Fund Time Bomb, the Chinese Real Estate Bubble, the Treasury Bond Bubble, the disappearance of non-program trading volume in the stock market, hyper-inflation, hyper-deflation, the commercial real estate shoe-to-drop, the Municipal Bond Minefield, etc.  All ugly problems, but all Black Swans?

Or just Black Ducks that will be unpleasant to deal with but dealt with regardless?

What's been said:

Discussions found on the web
  1. Black Ducks & EMH Origins | The Big Picture commented on Sep 29

    […] The Reformed Broker:  Sometimes It’s Just a Black Duck “The trouble with the Recency Effect is that everyone all of a sudden thought they were […]

  2. immediate edge reviews commented on Sep 28

    … [Trackback]

    […] Here you will find 89384 additional Info to that Topic: thereformedbroker.com/2010/09/29/sometimes-its-just-a-black-duck/ […]

  3. grc software commented on Oct 17

    … [Trackback]

    […] Read More here to that Topic: thereformedbroker.com/2010/09/29/sometimes-its-just-a-black-duck/ […]

  4. Hire Online web Designer in Canada commented on Dec 15

    … [Trackback]

    […] Information to that Topic: thereformedbroker.com/2010/09/29/sometimes-its-just-a-black-duck/ […]

  5. cheap wigs commented on Dec 17

    … [Trackback]

    […] Find More here on that Topic: thereformedbroker.com/2010/09/29/sometimes-its-just-a-black-duck/ […]

  6. sexygame commented on Dec 17

    … [Trackback]

    […] Find More on that Topic: thereformedbroker.com/2010/09/29/sometimes-its-just-a-black-duck/ […]

  7. AWS DevOps commented on Jan 15

    … [Trackback]

    […] Find More Information here to that Topic: thereformedbroker.com/2010/09/29/sometimes-its-just-a-black-duck/ […]

  8. human hair wigs commented on Jan 19

    … [Trackback]

    […] Information to that Topic: thereformedbroker.com/2010/09/29/sometimes-its-just-a-black-duck/ […]

  9. Altronix T2428175 manuals commented on Jan 23

    … [Trackback]

    […] Here you can find 76161 additional Info to that Topic: thereformedbroker.com/2010/09/29/sometimes-its-just-a-black-duck/ […]

  10. cibc on line banking commented on Jan 26

    … [Trackback]

    […] Read More to that Topic: thereformedbroker.com/2010/09/29/sometimes-its-just-a-black-duck/ […]

  11. officiële site commented on Feb 03

    … [Trackback]

    […] Find More here to that Topic: thereformedbroker.com/2010/09/29/sometimes-its-just-a-black-duck/ […]