Nearly a decade after his now laughably idiotic prediction that the Fed could hike rates in "15 minutes if we have to" - which of course it could and it would then promptly crash markets as late 2018 showed which is also why the Fed will never be able to normalize monetary policy ever again - former Fed Chairman, who together with Alan Greenspan will be responsible for blowing the three biggest asset bubbles in history of which the current one may well be last one as it will mark the end of central banking as we know it, Ben Bernanke delivered what he called "a relatively upbeat" assessment of the U.S. central bank's ability to fight the next recession.

Ahead of his address to the American Economic Association's annual meeting on Saturday, Bernanke wrote in a blog post that "the new policy tools are effective," perhaps seeking to reassure himself and other central bankers rather than the population and commercial banks around the globe, which is reeling form an onslaught of populism in response to the historic wealth transfer programs initiated by central banks whose negative rate policies have brought the European financial sector to the edge of the abyss.

"Central bank purchases of longer-term financial assets, popularly known as quantitative easing or QE, have proved an effective tool for easing financial conditions and providing economic stimulus when short rates are at their lower bound. The effectiveness of QE does not depend on its being deployed during a period of market turbulence."