The stock market keeps falling and falling because, for the first time in 14 years, there’s nobody to catch it. The “Fed put” has expired. The genesis of the Federal Reserve’s implicit put—the notion that the Fed will fix any decline—was the 2008 Financial Crisis. With the financial system on the ropes, the stock market itself became “too big to fail” as far as the Fed was concerned. Then-Chairman Ben Bernanke printed a bunch of money, boosted the market and became a Wall Street (bank, at least) hero. Since then, the Fed has cradled the stock market. Anytime the S&P 500 hiccups or corrects, the central bank steps in to print money.… Read more