Insurrection Day Was Easier for Markets Than Us
Stocks did a better job of digesting the painful scenes in the U.S. Capitol than many of those watching.
Capital markets have a long history of being untroubled by violent demonstrations.
Photographer: Win McNamee/Getty Images
I sit down to write this at the end of a day of historic political drama in the U.S. Friends in New York feel as shocked by today’s events as they were by 9/11 — and having also lived through that, I tend to agree. In Congress, politicians drew parallels not only to 9/11 but to Pearl Harbor, and to the burning of the Capitol by the British army during the War of 1812. The bloodshed and death toll this time weren’t remotely comparable to any of these events, but beyond that, those comparisons seem perfectly reasonable.
Meanwhile, it was also a dramatic day on the markets. These two things have almost nothing to do with each other.