Corporate bonds - Stable house prices the key to confidence

The most important reality we have learned in recent months is that there is no quick fix to the protracted credit crisis. At the beginning of 2008, many expected a tough year with some recovery as we approached 2009. The sheer magnitude of the ensuing fallout was not fully anticipated and any hopes of a return to normality by the end of the year have disappeared. The markets have been left reeling as seemingly indestructible US institutions like Bear Stearns, Lehmans, Merrill Lynch and AIG fell victim to unprecedented conditions, while some of the UK's largest banks have had to raise new...