I really don't know. The stock market is somewhat balanced by bonds (and short selling?) in that they are alternative positions for people to go into in order t

I really don't know. The stock market is somewhat balanced by bonds (and short selling?) in that they are alternative positions for people to go into in order to profit from changing conditions - but there doesn't seem to have been much of a way for the market position itself relative to credit becoming more expensive. I guess at the really abstract level you want independent agents to balance each other such that the sum of their positions resistant to change rather than reinforcing each other so they can all fail at once.