Early Rally Peters Out: U.S. Markets Down $11 Trillion in 17 Months

Part of the reason the massive bailouts and money creation haven't lit the inflation fuse yet. Between deleveraging, credit writedowns and worldwide wealth destruction we might be looking at a $30 Trillion hit to the world's balance sheet.
From the Wall Street Journal:

Markets remained locked in a familiar pattern on Friday as an early stock rally evaporated nearly as quickly as it began, leaving indexes near their worst levels in more than 12 years.

At 11:00 a.m., the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 45 points, giving up all of its early triple-digit advance. American Express, General Motors and Hewlett-Packard were among the companies pulling down the benchmark. The S&P 500-stock index sank about 0.4% while the Nasdaq Composite Index slid 1.2%....

...Stocks have lost $11 trillion in market value since the October 2007 peak, based on the Dow Jones Wilshire 5000 index, which includes nearly every U.S.-listed stock. Losses since the start of 2009 are $2.6 trillion. Nearly half of all stocks in the index are now trading at less than $5, and 37% are under $3....MORE