“LOVE is like war: easy to begin but very hard to stop,” observed H.L. Mencken, an American writer. Less poetically, he might have added market meddling to the mix. China had planned this week to dismantle some of the rescue measures put in place when the stockmarket crashed last summer. That prospect helped to spook investors: stocks fell by 7% on January 4th, the first trading day of 2016, their worst-ever start to a new year. Chinese regulators are once again wading in, however haplessly—on January 7th, shares dropped by another 7%.   Continue reading