I've been doing some research on "the" stock market, i.e., publicly traded shares of corporate ownership. A few thoughts: It's an "everybody knows" that fear drives the market. But that's not quite right and pretty much backwards. Rather, It's confidence that drives the market , along with its obvious corollary, and the lack thereof . Confidence is an interesting subject all on its own. Peculiarly it's not rooted in actuality or even truth. Ask any con man. It's just believing in something or someone. When it comes to having confidence that a corporation will continue to be viable and return a profit there are several areas to consider. Chief among these is confidence in a company's CEO. Perhaps the best exemplar of this could currently be Elon Musk, fearless leader of Tesla Corp. His "Think Big" insouciance and managing to remain prominent in the public eye has much to do with the billions spent to finance his operation