Jonathan Franzen Quotes

In an economy that already has lost some momentum, one must remain alert to the possibility that greater caution and weakening asset values in financial markets could signal or precipitate an excessive softening in household and business spending.

Bulls don't read. Bears read financial history. As markets fall to bits, the bears dust off the Dutch tulip mania of 1637, the Banque Royale of 1719-20, the railway speculation of the 1840s, the great crash of 1929.

We had a booming stock market in 1929 and then went into the world's greatest depression. We have a booming stock market in 1999. Will the bubble somehow burst, and then we enter depression? Well, some things are not different.

These heroes of finance are like beads on a string; when one slips off, all the rest follow.

The crisis in Europe has affected the U.S. economy by acting as a drag on our exports, weighing on business and consumer confidence, and pressuring U.S. financial markets and institutions.

No one saw the recession coming.

Blaming speculators as a response to financial crisis goes back at least to the Greeks. It's almost always the wrong response.

What we know about the global financial crisis is that we don't know very much.

Imperceptibly, the developed world's manufacturing base was gradually eroding and being replaced by securitized finance that destroyed itself and nearly its economies in 2008.

A recession is a period in which you tighten your belt. In a depression, you have no belt to tighten. In a panic you have no pants left to hold up.

… a pin lies in wait for every bubble. And when the two eventually meet, a new wave of investors learns some very old lessons..

Some things never change - there will be another crisis, and its impact will be felt by the financial markets.

Remnants of the foreclosure crisis linger everywhere.

Every serious deflation I've looked at is preceded by an asset bubble, and then it bursts.

My father's money vanished in the Great Depression, and he had trouble keeping a job.

Brexit will lead to a flight of talent, money and taxes - and the country will have to take on more and more debt.

COVID-19 has upended our economy.

Anytime there's a disruption in the supply chain, any time people cut back on spending, there will be a recession.

Financial markets need to become less, not more, efficient.

The world of finance is a mysterious world in which, incredible as the fact may appear, evaporation precedes liquidation.

When interest rates are low we have conditions for asset bubbles to develop, and they are developing at the moment. The ultimate asset bubble is gold.

If in fact the rates go up because the president refuses to budge then he will have to answer for that next year when our economy is not growing. When, unfortunately, people lose their jobs who work at a dental clinic as a medical billing specialist, or the paralegal at a law firm loses their job, or the courier at the law firm loses a job, these are not millionaires and billionaires.

It's the deleveraging that's going on right now that has caused the credit crisis.

I believe the only things that really matter in investing are the bubbles and the busts

The times are too difficult and the crisis too severe to indulge in schadenfreude. Looking at it in perspective, the fact that there would be a financial crisis was perfectly predictable: its general nature, if not its magnitude. Markets are always inefficient.