It's amazing how a sharp rise in the stockmarket can change people's opinions about the economy. With the S&P 500 at its highest level since May 2008, even votaries of doom have turned into cheerful optimists.

Alas, our graph for the velocity of M_c shows quite the opposite. It shows the velocity at its lowest level in the past decade, indicating that the US (and with it no doubt a large part of the world) is heading for a crash followed by a recession. Or will it be a Depression?