Is This a Depression? For Markets, It May Not Matter
Jeff Cox, CNBC.com | 04 Mar 2009 | 02:48 PM ET
“Call it whatever you like—recession or depression—the current economic state has investors concerned that a worst-case scenario is in the offing.
Many think the word “depression” is, in fact, incidental to the real state of affairs. Things are bad, really bad, and everybody knows it.
“The closest thing we can find to the market collapse that we are experiencing now would really be ’73-’74,” says Peter J. Tanous, president and director of Lynx Investment Advisory in Washington, D.C. “The market went down over the two-year period 45 percent. I was already in the business 10 years in ’73, and I can tell you this is far, far worse.”