Capitalism is based on self-interest and self-esteem; it holds integrity and trustworthiness as cardinal virtues and makes them pay off in the marketplace, thus demanding that men survive by means of virtue, not vices. It is this superlatively moral system that the welfare statists propose to improve upon by means of preventative law, snooping bureaucrats, and the chronic goad of fear.

By far the most significant event in finance during the past decade has been the extraordinary development and expansion of financial derivatives.

History has not dealt kindly with the aftermath of protracted periods of low risk premiums.

Any onset of increased investor caution elevates risk premiums and, as a consequence, lowers asset values and promotes the liquidation of the debt that supported higher asset prices, ... This is the reason that history has not dealt kindly with the aftermath of protracted periods of low risk premiums.

I am saddened that it is politically inconvenient to acknowledge what everyone knows: the Iraq war is largely about oil.

The process of innovation is, of course, never ending.

What we have found over the years in the marketplace is that derivatives have been an extraordinarily useful vehicle to transfer risk from those who shouldn't be taking it to those who are willing to and are capable of doing so.