From The Times
August 26, 2009

Summer recovery will turn to a cold winter

The markets are rallying and confidence is returning, but don’t be fooled: there can be only hard economic times ahead

Ruth Lea

Market sentiment has in the past few months gone from bearish to bullish as pundits have declared the end of recession. The mood has gone from deep despair to extraordinary elation — this week marked the biggest six-month rally in world share prices for 50 years — as good news takes centre stage and bad news is consigned to the wings.

For example, last week’s comments by the Chairman of the Federal Reserve were interpreted with such partiality. Ben Bernanke’s statement that the US was “beginning to emergeâ€