Doll Thinks "Period of Greatest Risk" Has Passed

Blackrock’s Bob Doll says that it looks like odds of the European debt crisis being resolved are increasing, and that the danger to the stock market is abating.

“The debt crisis and ongoing economic uncertainty are likely to remain headwinds for stocks for some time,” Doll writes in his latest market commentary on Blackrock’s website, “but it does appear to us that markets have moved past the period of greatest risk.”

In Europe, Doll writes, “the odds are growing that policymakers will be able to contain the debt crisis and engineer some sort of stable and organized default of Greek debt”. European central bankers have also switched to a policy of easing interest rates rather than increasing them, which he sees as a positive. In the U.S., meanwhile, “risks of a renewed recession have been fading and while growth levels are certainly not robust, the economy does appear to be poised to continue to deliver modestly positive levels of growth,” Doll says.

Doll also discusses the possibility of the Federal Reserve enacting another round of quantitative easing (“QE3”). He says that while the Fed doesn’t appear ready to do so now, the group’s recent comments may have been an effort to pave the way for QE3 if conditions deteriorate.