stock market

As harrowing as the stock market's plunges have been in recent days, they still haven't been enough to trigger the "circuit breaker" mechanisms that result in an automatic timeout in trading.

Could it be just a year ago that jubilant investors were celebrating record highs in the stock market?

The country was on the verge of going bankrupt as the government shut down the stock market and seized control of its last major independent bank.

Fleeing the stock market for the comfort of safe and insured, investors with a time horizon beyond a few years may be doing real damage to their long-term finances.

The bear market ravaging investor portfolios is now one of the worst in modern U.S. history and has wiped out more than $7 trillion, with no bottom clearly in sight.

Wallets snapped shut in the last month as consumers faced a plunging stock market and home prices.

The end of the ban on short-selling, on Wednesday night, is not expected to spark another plunge in the stock market, but some steps remain in place to hem short-sellers.

The stock market seem to be stabilizing, aided by news that the Federal Reserve will buy up short-term debt in order to get companies financially interacting again.

I won't get into the gruesome details, but buying up short term debt (known as commercial paper on Wall Street - a mechanism that enables companies to borrow money overnight or or over the course of a few days) is an area that the Federal Reserve rarely gets into.

Of course, these are historic times and the Fed will every tool in its arsenal to reverse the sliding economy.

That's what we're seeing here - and it seems to be...

“Whatever money you may need for the next five years, please take it out of the stock market right now, this week.

I do not believe that you should risk those assets in the stock market right now.”

I wonder how much influence Jim Cramer has on the markets. The host of CNBC's "Mad Money" went on the Today show Monday and told investors to get out."Whatever money you may need for the next 5 years, please take it out of the stock market right now, this week," he said.

"I do not believe that you should risk those assets in the stock market"