Depression Fears Subside on Bernanke Remarks, Stocks

March 16 (Bloomberg) — The biggest four-day surge in U.S. stocks since November and reassuring comments from Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke soothed concern that the U.S. is headed for its first depression in seven decades.

“The financial meltdown and accompanying depression scenario has been taken off the table,” said Jack Ablin, chief investment officer at Chicago-based Harris Private Bank, which oversees $60 billion. “The heart of the problem is the banking system, and news coming out of that sector suggests that we may have turned a corner.”

Banks from Citigroup Inc. and Bank of America Corp. to Barclays Plc indicated in the past week that earnings have been rising since the start of the year, and government data showed U.S. retail sales may be stabilizing after a six-month rout. With officials working on details of their bank-rescue plan, Bernanke said in an interview with CBS television’s 60 Minutes that the main risk is a shortage of political will to complete the task.

While the Standard & Poor’s 500 Stock Index surrendered a gain of as much as 2.4 percent today, closing down 0.4 percent, the gauge is still up 11 percent in the past week, the best performance this year.

Bank must get rid of the back log of empty foreclosed houses at a much faster rate than they are presently working at. If more of these homes were being sold it would clear the way for new building in the not so distant future.

Banks helped to get us into this mess and banks are slowing down the rate at which we get out. Their actions have to be questioned.