Greenspan has left the building

As global markets wobbled nervously last week, one thought appeared uppermost in the minds of many i...

As global markets wobbled nervously last week, one thought appeared uppermost in the minds of many investors: If this gets nasty, then Alan Greenspan is not going to be standing by to bail us out this time. The 'Greenspan Put' - the helpful way the former Federal Reserve chairman responded to big declines in the stock market by delivering a cut in interest rates - is assumed to have left the building along with the man himself. The current ruling clique of central bankers - Ben Bernanke at the Fed, Jean-Claude Trichet at the European Central Bank and Mervyn King at the Bank of England - i...