I always found complex physics and chemistry less challenging
than the twisted logic of economics when I was a young student. I
was much happier with long meteorological equations involving
the Stephan-Boltzmann constant and adiabatic lapse rates than
factors affecting things like exchange and interest rates.
Over the past few years it feels as if the logic of economics
(if there ever was any) has disappeared and horizons have shortened
so much that financial advisers have become passengers and reactive
observers of our times rather than predictors of sustained,
beneficial future performance.
So much of our financial system is interlinked, involving a
complex and confusing web of computerised market triggers and
irrational, emotional responses to geopolitical events that it is
difficult to discern what is happening in real time, let alone what
may happen next week or next month. These interconnections are
leading to substantial volatility in an environment of
