Now we have clarity. Last week’s awful employment data from the US ended all arguments about whether the US is heading for a recession: it is already in one. Now we need only argue about its severity and its duration.

Meanwhile, the equity market has given up its attempt to deny the credit crisis and has lapsed into a bear market, defined as a 20 per cent fall from peak to trough. Europe, Japan and China are already in bear markets. The S&P 500 is down only 17 per cent, but this is an illusion of the weak dollar: in euro terms it is down 27 per cent.