With inflation devastating the value of national currencies, Western economies in the dumps, and oil prices soaring because of tension in the Middle East, anxious investors had fled to the security that supposedly only gold could provide.
The derivatives market weathered its last near-death experience in early 2005, when credit agencies downgraded the debt of General Motors and Ford, devastating the value of the most risky synthetic derivatives.
Higher inflation devastates the value of fixed-income assets, as investors found to their cost in the 1970s.
And with the banking system devastated, the value of the Iraqi dinar sinking and the larger government economy unable to offer support, it is unclear how long those private businesses now operating can run before they stall again.
Liquidity and credit suddenly become scarce and a devastating, value-destroying uncertainty takes hold.
His regular customers – second homeowners – have been hammered by a devastating property collapse, with the value of their holiday homes plummeting by as much as two-thirds.
These offences against the social dignity which Pankhurst had always valued devastated the elderly woman; to make matters worse, many people believed the "Miss Pankhurst" in newspaper headlines referred to Christabel.
If you give up your life to science and then find out you're not valued -- it's devastating".
As he walked around his house, Mr. Schneider insisted that the downturn, while financially devastating, has not changed his core values.
They said he appeared at a time when Japan was starting to rediscover the value of its traditions after devastating defeat.
And that maintains, that goes on, unless something devastating happens and you change your core values.
