The animal spirits are stirring again in the markets as the asset management industry grows to a record level and shrugs off some of the debilitating effects of the financial crisis.
The amount of money invested globally by asset managers has for the first time surpassed the highs before the 2007-08 crisis, according to Boston Consulting Group, the management consultants.
Gary Shub, partner at BCG, agreed that animal spirits, a term used by economist John Maynard Keynes to describe positive actions because of instinctive optimism, had recovered in the markets, although he warned it was not a fully fledged revival.
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"The worst appears to have passed, but there is uncertainty over the unwinding of quantitative easing and the impact of the eurozone, where there are still problems," he said.