Well, this is a fine mess he's gotten us into . . . Greenspan's remarks to bank regulators voicing concerns about whether investors are underestimating stock market risk sent the stock market into a major swoon Friday morning. He also grumbled about loans backed by investments, urging that risk managers set aside more reserves. Is he thinking of the near-collapse of Long Term Capital Management last year? I don't get it - if the Fed is worried about the stock market's valuation and they don't want to prick the bubble with a far-reaching interest rate increase, why don't they raise margin requirements for brokerage accounts and pressure the heck out of the big institutions that lend money to hedge funds? My business partner and I suspect that he doesn't want to raise rates, so he's beating up the stock market instead to cool things down a bit. I just wish he'd use some of the other tools in his kit.

As I said last week, the Fed should have raised rates, period. All Greenspan is doing is roiling a market that's bound to be awash in uncertainty until January if only because of Y2K.

The "Greenspan drop" in the stock market was exacerbated by a big 1.1% jump in the PPI due to tobacco and oil prices, as well as by "double witching" day. The PPI wasn't great news, but clearly contains some aberrations. In the meantime, the economy is just fine, thank you. And corporate earnings look good, as I expected, but companies that disappoint get hammered. Hang it up for the rest of the year!