The eternal zero

FOR FINANCIAL markets the 2010s were a time when it was hard to tell good news from bad. Even as the world laboured to shake off the financial crisis, the prices of stocks and bonds—not to mention houses—kept climbing. But good news, such as wage growth picking up, could cause markets to wobble. The reason was uncertainty over how far growth would go before central banks, especially the Federal Reserve, raised interest rates. Anything presaging monetary tightening caused bearishness. In the link between economy and markets, monetary policy was a signal dampener.